


The Return of John Silver

by Magnetism_bind



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Anal Sex, Angst and Humor, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bathing/Washing, Blow Jobs, Canon-Typical Violence, Complicated Relationships, Deception, Denial of Feelings, Despair, Dreams and Nightmares, Feelings Realization, Fever Dreams, First Kiss, First Meetings, First Time Together, Getting to Know Each Other, Grief/Mourning, Grieving, Guilt, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Injury Recovery, Insecurity, Intimacy, Jealousy, Large Cock, Loud Sex, Love, Love Confessions, Lust at First Sight, M/M, Meant To Be, Mildly Dubious Consent, Miscommunication, Multi, Mutual Pining, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Regret, Secrets, Size Kink, Sleep Groping, Suicidal Thoughts, Survivor Guilt, Threesome - M/M/M, Touch-Starved, Unconscious Sex, Voyeurism, Whump, mentions of Miranda Barlow - Freeform, mentions of Silver/Madi - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-18
Updated: 2019-06-18
Packaged: 2020-04-12 14:48:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19134250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magnetism_bind/pseuds/Magnetism_bind
Summary: Seven months after leaving Savannah and the war behind, Flint and Thomas are doing their best to leave the past where it belongs. But the past is never quite past. When the arrival of a wounded pirate on their doorstep threatens to shake what little foundation they’ve managed to build together, Flint finds himself at a familiar crossroads. Does he allow himself to admit that John Silver belongs in his life, (and in Thomas’s) or will he continue to deny the truth even to himself?





	The Return of John Silver

**Author's Note:**

> Art by the fantastic @finngualart! <333

 

  
_Part 1_

 

It’s barely loud enough to make any noise at all, just the faintest brush of a knock against the door, but Thomas’s eyelids flutter open. He’s been dozing by the fire for some time. The fire itself is mere embers now and there’s a faint chill to the room.

He listens, but there’s no sound and for a moment Thomas wonders if he imagined it. But then the dog, still the dog, there is no name for the animal who’s made a home with them, stiffens, looking intently at the door.

Thomas offers it a reassuring stroke across the ears and rises. He’ll check the door, build up the fire and then go to bed. There’s no point in staying up any later tonight anyway. James isn’t due to return for another week at least.

He crosses the worn wooden floor and goes to the door. Again he listens, and again there’s nothing he can discern, no sound that makes itself heard in the night. And yet, he knows instinctively there’s something there. Something out there in the darkness, waiting for him to open the door.

Thomas reaches for the pistol they keep in the kitchen, stashed atop the cupboard by the door. It’s easy enough to reach for him, and perfectly hidden to anyone else. He hasn’t used it once since they’ve been here, but he knows James keeps it regularly oiled and loaded.

Pistol in hand he readies himself and pulls open the door.

For a moment there is simply the blackness of night stretching out before him, the shadows and whispers of the trees beyond the small garden, and the vast cloudy sky above. Then he looks closer. There, leaning against the doorway, one hand on the wooden frame, is a man. His eyes are closed, one arm drawn close across his chest like he’s holding himself steady, and barely managing it. His coat is threadbare and filthy upon his thin frame, and he’s shivering as he turns his face towards the bright warmth of the open doorway.

He looks up at Thomas, blinking hazily at him.

“Hello?” Thomas says warily.

The man’s eyes widen and then he simply murmurs, “Fuck,” and crumples in a heap, half on the doorstep, half on the porch.

Thomas stashes the pistol in his belt and reaches for him. Lifting the man is appallingly easy, he’s frightfully thin. Thomas carries him inside and closes the door before looking around the room and trying to decide what to do with him.

There’s the kitchen, and the front room, and their bedroom and an attic storeroom, but it’s too cold up there. The front room has only chairs to sit upon, so bedroom it is.

He carries the man into the bedroom and lays him down upon the bed.

The man’s eyes don’t open and for a moment Thomas fears he’s dead. But when he places a hand upon the man’s chest, he can feel a distant, but steady heartbeat. He breathes a long sigh of relief. There will be no burials tonight, no bodies wrapped in linen and carried away, no stench of death lingering in their absence.

He shakes his head slightly, clearing his mind of the ever lingering past, and turns his attention back to the man. His clothes are filthy, covered in dirt and blood. Thomas already regrets laying him on their clean sheets.

He’ll have to be wrapped in something warm and clean, and possibly bathed, though here Thomas hesitates. He hated every single time they were forced to bathe in the asylum. It was not a relief, or a kindness, merely another form of cruelty.

He will be gentle then.

He leaves the man there on the bed and goes to build up the fire and heat the water.

 

*  *  *

 

While the water heats he returns to the bedroom and starts removing the man’s clothes. His coat is ragged and worn, but on top of that, there’s fresh dirt smeared on the sleeves and on the knees of his breeches when Thomas examined them. He has no explanation for that, so he merely goes about removing the articles of clothing and setting them aside. If he can wash them, he’ll try, but he expects burning them will be a more reasonable option.

The man has only one leg. Thomas pauses when he realizes it. That first huddled heap at his feet hadn’t revealed that, but now there’s no missing it. The left leg is cut neatly below the knee, the stump old and scarred though it looks recently raw and wounded anew. There are fresh sores there, most certainly infected.

He reaches for the man’s shirt and draws it open, only to have his hands falter. With the stump, he could have excused the wound with the exertions of travel and weariness, but this...this is more than that. This is the aftermath of violence, the effects of torture pure and simple. Mottled bruises cover the man’s slender torso. Thomas can count every one of the man’s ribs, and now he can see the painfully drawn breaths as the man’s chest rises and falls. There’s a deep wound, badly wrapped with a filthy cloth across the man’s midsection. That will need tending to, first off.

Thomas pulls the shirt free from the man’s shoulders gently and lowers him back again. The man makes a faint sound, close to a moan. On a hunch, Thomas turns him on his side and examines his back.

_Oh god._

For a moment he’s not sure he can do this. He doesn’t have the skills, but beyond that, merely seeing the man’s lacerated skin is too much. Too much memory, too much pain, too much of the past sweeping back into him.

There’s a low whine at his side and Thomas looks down. The dog is there, looking up at him with watchful eyes. Thomas lowers a hand automatically to scratch his ears, to remind him it’s all right, and in doing so, he remembers this himself. He’s no longer in Bedlam, he’s miles away, across an ocean in fact, and he will never be there again.

His hands steady themselves. The man before him needs tending and he _can_ do that. He can clean and wash his wounds and wrap them. He can do his best to keep the infection from spreading, and he can try to keep him alive. So that’s what he intends to do.

 

*  *  *

 

The water is finally hot enough and he carries a bucket into the bedroom. The man is not well enough for a full bath and Thomas will not force that on any man, so for now a hand bath will have to do. Thomas removes the tattered shirt altogether and finally reaches for the man’s underclothes.

He has seen men before, before James, and after, but there is still a curious intimacy to this. Even here, a completely non-sexual situation, it’s still his hands upon this man’s body, this man laying nude before him. The man’s hips are very slender too, and his groin, Thomas skirts over it, but still sees the dark curls there and the man’s cock lying still. He can see no wounds or scars there fortunately, so he turns his attention back to the upper torso.

Slowly, Thomas washes the man’s body, carefully, with gentle hands. He tends the chest wound with the most care, washing it clean and binding it with clean bandages. It looks as though it were done with a knife, cut downwards across the chest. It’s not as deep as he fears, though it still looks to be painful.  Slowly the scars and open wounds on the man’s back are also tended and new bandages placed there as well.

The rinsing bowl is brown and foul by the time he’s done, and the hour is late. Thomas finds a spare pair of underclothes and breeches for the man to wear. He leaves a shirt off for now so he can check the wounds, but he covers the man with a thick blanket to keep him warm. Not once have the man’s eyes opened during all of this, and Thomas places a hand on his forehead to make sure he’s not feverish.

Throughout all of this, the dog watches him with a quiet gaze. Thomas is grateful for the company, even if the room is still silent save for the wounded man’s quiet breathing.

He empties the bucket out the back and brings it back. By now he’s exhausted and ready for sleep, but the man is in the bed. Thomas builds up the fire while he thinks about where he is to sleep.

He’s left the clothes in a pile near the kitchen door, still trying to decide what to do with him. He still wonders about the dirt on them. On a whim he opens the door and steps out on the porch.

He finds the crutch abandoned by the front gate, which explains the dirt on the man’s clothes and knees. He must have crawled from there to the door, holding himself up by the door before his collapse.

Thomas carries the crutch inside and carefully sets it by the door. He closes the door and locks it, hearing the sound of the bolt slide home, solid and firm. A reminder to himself that he is safe, and James will return.

He knows for certain now, who it is that is currently residing in his and James’s bed, unconscious and wounded and close to death. Thomas had his suspicions but now between the leg and the crutch, it is confirmed.

It is none other than John Silver.

 

 *  *  *

 

For the first few days Thomas watches over him, hour by hour. He learns to know the sound of Silver’s breathing, calm and steady when he’s resting peacefully, labored and drawn, low in his chest when he’s feverish and dreaming.

Silver dreams frequently. Thomas bathes his brow and does his best to bring the fever down but that is all he can do. It’s too far to go to leave Silver alone to fetch a doctor. If James would only return…

The wounds mend slowly, if a little crudely. There will be scars and Thomas has a feeling Silver is already well acquainted with those. It is another point they have in common, and one he wishes they did not share.

It’s been three days when Silver starts speaking in his sleep. At first Thomas thinks he’s awake, but then quickly realizes, from the half-closed eyes, the sweat on Silver’s brow and the words upon his lips that he’s not aware of his surroundings.

“Leave me alone.” He whispers. “I’ve told you everything.”

Carefully Thomas dips the cloth in the bowl and lays it over his brow again. Silver’s so warm. He wishes the fever would go.

“I have nothing left to tell you.” Silver whispers. “There are no more secrets here.”

Even in his feverish state, even here, Thomas doubts that. This man must have more secrets, all men do. Even Thomas.

He tries to guess what scenarios are playing through Silver’s mind, what memories are revisiting him, but it’s difficult. He knows so little of the life upon that faraway island that James once shared with this man. All he truly knows are the stories he’s heard during his brief travels, those retold in the inns and tavern and fields, by sailors and innkeepers, soldiers and guards. They are not flattering stories, but Thomas listened all the same. The bloodthirsty ravages of Captain Flint and Long John Silver, true terrors of the Spanish Main, were known throughout the alehouses along the Southern coastline. Even at the plantation, Thomas had heard the tales.

“Please, no more, _please_.” Silver’s hands clench against the blanket. “Please. ”

He gasps, reaching blindly for something, anything to defend himself and Thomas catches his arms, holding him as still and quiet as he can until Silver’s struggles subside and he falls back against the bed once more. His pillow, damp with sweat, his eyes still closed in dreams.

“I can’t tell you anything more.” Silver murmurs.

Thomas gently brushes the sweaty curls back from Silver’s face. He looks at him for a long time, taking in all the features that Flint had seen every day, gazed at for no considerable amount of time, in anger and in humor, and in friendship and lust. He thinks of how Flint’s hands must have done this at some point, this tending to Silver, his hands upon Silver’s slight frame, caring for him, and making sure he stays in this world, and not departing for the next.

What was it that had made Flint forsake this man? What was the betrayal that could be so beyond resolution? Thomas found it hard to believe it was simply the discovery that he himself was alive. If it was...did he trust the sort of man who could abandon someone after loving them?

 

*  *  *

 

The sun finally breaks through the clouds. Silver’s been there for over a week. There’s no word from James but Thomas hasn’t really expected there to be. James will simply return when he does. They’ve established a pattern over the last few months they’ve been here. James goes to fetch the supplies and Thomas waits for him to return.

This time, the longer he’s gone though, the more Thomas almost grows accustomed to it simply being Silver and himself in the cottage. He reads to Silver at night, hoping the sound of his voice will be comforting, or possibly stir Silver from his fever dreams. And possibly too, he does it for the singular measure of companionship it offers, however slight, simply because he’s tired of being alone. The dog sleeps at his feet, ears cocked for the first stirring from the stranger in the bed.

 

*  *  *

 

In his dreams Silver’s  back there again. Standing upon that wretched island with the hot sand beneath his boot, the sun beating down, and the everlasting sea stretching out between him and the rest of the world.

In his dreams, there’s no respite from anything, the torments that lurked in the shadows during the day, easily barricaded by drink, were set free. He had never known half of them by name, they were only dim figures of the past he had left behind so very long ago. But the ones whose names he did know…there was no escape from them.

In his dreams he wasn’t even sure he wanted there to be. In his waking hours, though he wanted oblivion.

 

*  *  *

 

Silver looks so small curled on his side in the large bed, his face half buried in the pillow. Thomas watches him. When Silver stirs for the third time, he leans over to feel his forehead. Today his skin seems a natural heat. Thomas is still concerned about fever, but Silver still looks cold, and Thomas is weary. He’s been dozing in the armchairs for the past week, sleeping by the fire, barely long enough to call it rest, in case Silver wakes and needs something.

At last he gives in to the exhaustion tugging at his mind and slips into bed beside Silver. If he sleeps here for a few hours he’ll be easily awakened if Silver stirs again. His eyes close all too quickly and Thomas is lost to sleep. 

Some time later Thomas wakes, feeling warm and contented. He breathes in the scent of sweat and warm skin. Thomas curls his head in closer, wanting more, before he opens his eyes.

Silver is right up against him, his body curled into Thomas’s as though they’ve slept here a hundred times before. Thomas debates whether he should move before Silver wakes, though he’s not certain when that will be. He has no wish to make the man uncomfortable.

He shifts slightly, thinking about moving away completely when he freezes.

There’s a hand moving between their bodies, and it’s not his. He looks at Silver but there’s no sign that Silver’s even awake. Thomas stares at the wall over Silver’s head. This is not what he meant to happen at all. Silver’s hand presses against him harder, and Thomas is only human. His cock responds eagerly, hardening immediately.

“You want this.” Silver murmurs so softly.

Thomas freezes.

He leans his head closer, Silver’s forehead is burning. Silver’s eyes are still closed, or half closed, he’s not lucid. Thomas breathes a little easier. At least this fever excuses whatever Silver’s doing at the moment. There’s no way he’s aware of what he’s doing. If he were awake, there’d be no way he’d be touching Thomas now. Thomas knows that, even if foolishly the knowledge pains him a little. It has no right to do so. He has no right to want this from Silver, of all men.

“Please.” Silver whispers again. “Let me touch you.”

Who does he think Thomas is? A crew member? A former lover? James? Or _Flint_ , more accurately. It must be that.

Thomas hesitates. He should stop this, try to dissuade Silver. But Silver’s hand is already sliding inside his breeches, stroking along the hardened length of him. His hand is so warm upon Thomas’s cock. Thomas muffles a cry of agonized pleasure as Silver touches him.

Silver utters a soft moan of his own, as his hand slides over Thomas’s cock. He bites his lip, stoking harder, and harder until Thomas can’t hold back any longer. His release coats Silver’s palm. He can feel it spreading over Silver’s hand. Silver shudders, tensing against Thomas, and then he sighs, soft and distant. His eyes are still closed.

Thomas slips out of bed. He fetches some clean clothes and goes to the wardrobe to find a clean pair of drawers. He cleans himself off, his back turned to Silver while he changes. Once he’s dressed again he turns back to Silver.

He draws back the blankets carefully, but Silver still doesn’t wake. Silver, who judging by the stain upon his crotch, also finished while touching Thomas.

Thomas bares his lower half and cleans Silver off. Silver’s cock, now sated and still, is soft against his thigh. He is an embarrassingly long length even when unaroused. Thomas can’t help one admiring glance. Then he fetches another pair of drawers for Silver as well.

He scrubs the soiled underclothes out in the kitchen and hangs them before the fire to dry. Thomas gives a wry smile as he studies them. If this keeps up, he’s going to run out of underclothes.

 

*  *  *

 

In his dreams Silver is on the maroon island once again. He walks for miles before he sees Flint standing on the bluff, and his heart constricts. It’s with tentative steps he moves towards Flint. Everything is tentative between them these days. Tentative conversation. Tentative plans. Tentative hope.

A tentative hand reaching out between them.

Silver often wonders what would happen if he let that dream become a reality here upon this bluff. What Flint would do.

Flint turns and smiles at him, and his heart constricts again. With one simple gesture, a gesture that is not remotely simple, for how often does Flint truly smile, he disarms Silver so completely. Silver reminds himself that that is why they are bothering to train. Because Flint thinks he needs it, and Silver is not stupid, he knows he needs to know how to protect himself. But _this_ is what he needs protection from, the ease with which he moves in step with Flint, how he wants to let himself be drawn even closer towards Flint. He wonders at the manifest ways in which desire reveals itself. So simple and so subtle, that Silver needs it thrust into his heart a hundred times before he can admit it to himself.

It’s only in his dreams that he remembers it so clearly now. There is no returning to that bluff, except in his dreams. There are no ways back to where things were.

 

*  *  *

 

Silver’s fever only lasts a day this time fortunately, for which Thomas is grateful. He doesn’t sleep beside Silver again. Though it didn’t seem to have any lasting effects, he thinks it isn’t fair to either of them. Silver doesn’t know who he is, and Thomas…is well, selfish enough that he wants to known for who he is, touched for _who_ he is.

He returns to reading to Silver, passing the long hours lost in words. It’s been a week and a half. How much longer will it take Silver to wake? What if he needs better care than what Thomas can give him?

If only James would return. At the same time, part of Thomas doesn’t want to face what will happen when he does. He won’t let himself think on that just now.

 

*  *  *

 

He’s sitting by the fire in the kitchen when Silver finally does wake. There’s a quiet rustling sound from the bedroom. At first Thomas doesn’t heed it, but the dog sits up, nose alert and ready, and then there’s another, the sound of bedclothes being drawn back.

He rises and goes to the doorway, dog at his heels.

Silver’s half sitting up in the bed, propping himself against the pillow as he looks around the room with bemused eyes. When he looks up and sees Thomas standing there, he freezes.

There is an eternity of silence. Thomas fears there will be a repeat of the porch for Silver is staring at him with the same incredulous expression.

At last Thomas speaks. “How’re you feeling?”

Silver just shakes his head. “The fuck am I doing here?” He pushes himself up further, but his limbs are still too weak and he slumps back with a faint snarl. The dog watches him warily, limbs tensed.

“You arrived here less than a fortnight ago.” Thomas informs him. “You collapsed in a fever.”

Silver raises a hand to his brow, rubbing it slowly, easing the ache there of all he doesn’t remember.

“I just showed up here?” He says slowly. “Nothing else?”

“What else could there be?” Thomas is genuinely curious about this as he’s been wondering how Silver managed to make it here alone ever since that first night. Someone must have brought him, surely.

Silver shakes his head and closes his eyes.

Thomas studies him a moment and then goes to the kitchen to make some tea. He has a feeling they’ll both need it.

 

*  *  *

 

 _Thomas fucking Hamilton_. Silver squeezes his eyes shut even tighter, as if in doing so, it will erase the figure of the man he just saw there in the doorway. A man who spoke to him, and by all accounts, seems to be the one looking after him. A man that he has imagined many times over, but the actual sight of him is almost more than he can bear.

He needs to get out of here before…he needs to go, but his limbs ache and he feels so deathly tired. Perhaps a little more rest won’t hurt. Perhaps none of this is real. Perhaps this is all still a dream. Perhaps it is hell.

There’s the sound of someone clearing their throat. Has to be Thomas. Will he go away if Silver ignores him? He wants to ignore him, wants to do just that so that the specter of Thomas Hamilton can return to the shadowy realms where it once existed, if never belonged.

“I thought you might like some tea.” Thomas sounds as though he’s treading carefully, even offering this. What stories has he heard, what has Flint told him, that he would take such care? He has to know who Silver is.

Doesn’t he?

What if he doesn’t? What if he’s simply the sort of man who takes in any stranger who happens to collapse on his doorstep and looks after them until they’re well again? It seems as likely as anything else. Perhaps there’s a way out of this yet, where he can simply leave without having to face Flint, and Thomas will simply refer to him as ‘that poor lame fellow I looked after.’

He can hope at least.

Silver opens his eyes.

Thomas brings two mugs over and sits down on the stool beside the bed, that damned dog at his heels. He does it with the ease of someone who’s done this action a hundred times and doesn’t think on it anymore. How long has he been sitting there beside Silver? What has he learned from Silver’s dreams? The thought is terrifying.

 

*  *  *

 

“Thank you.” Silver mutters, accepting the cup. The tea is hot and strong. He burns his throat with the first sip, but the shock of it rouses him even more.

“Why am I here?” Silver tries to push himself up again. The dog whines low in its throat, as though it knows Silver’s too weak to try anything. He glares at it, and the creature just wags its tail.

“You don’t remember?” Thomas only asks because if Silver truly doesn’t remember, then possibly he’s more injured than Thomas thought. The question causes Silver’s face to darken.

“If I knew the answer to that, I wouldn’t have asked, would I?” His fingers clutch the sheets as he glares up at Thomas, but it’s a weakened attempt and Thomas knows this, even if he’s never known the full strength version of that glare.

“Like I said, you simply arrived without warning on the doorstep.”

Silver grits his teeth like this conversation is costing him more than Thomas can know and perhaps it is. Perhaps this exchange is another form of torture in its own way.

“I remember, partly, how I got here.” Silver says slowly, forcing the words. “I meant…why am I here in your bed?”

“Because you were wounded.” Thomas looks at him quizzically. “There’s a pallet in the attic but truly this is easier, as it’s much closer to the fire.”

“Why?” Silver stares at him incredulously. “Why the fuck are you doing any of this?”

For that Thomas has no answer. He could simply repeat that Silver was wounded (is still wounded for that matter). Surely this is enough in its own way? Or he could say he simply didn’t want to report to the authorities that he let a man die on his doorstep. But there is simply the matter that he wouldn’t let such a thing happen. Even to John Silver.

“Because I thought you should still be alive when James returns.” He says finally, deciding it is both the safest answer and the most truthful in its own way.

Silver’s brow furrows faintly. For a moment he truly doesn’t know who Thomas is referring to.

“The man you know as Flint.” Thomas says quietly.

At that Silver’s hands tense upon the sheets, his eyes searching the room as though Flint might be waiting in the shadows even now, ready to step out and confront him.

“He’s not here.” Thomas points out, feeling a tad foolish. “If he were…”

“I’d be dead already.” Silver gives a hoarse laugh, that turns into a cough. He lies back down against the pillows, tea forgotten in his hands.

“Do you truly believe that?”

Silver turns his head, regarding Thomas for a moment. “Think of all the things he’s told you of me, and then tell me it would go differently.”

“I know very little about you.” Thomas doesn’t mean the words to cut; they do all the same. He sees Silver flinch and wonders if it’s worse that he should be told of this man’s dealings or be told nothing at all. His knowledge lies somewhere in-between. And yet, there’s a flicker of relief in Silver’s eyes, or does he imagine that?

“I see.” Silver says quietly. He turns his head away and Thomas rises, leaving him alone.

 

*  *  *

 

It’s not entirely a lie, Silver doesn’t remember precisely how he got here. He remembers the cell, he remembers the beatings, and the interrogations. He remembers hanging from the chains in the dark, the whip biting into his skin and the blood flowing down his back, with the flies gathering upon his wounds. The cesspit of stale water and offal, the stink of the cell surrounding him. These things he remembers. He also remembers shouting, the clanging of swords and pistol shots echoing down the darkened corridor as the torches went out.

He remembers Madi’s face…and the cart carrying him away, and after that…the dim sensation of needing something, something he had to do, something he had to find. But it’s all a blank wasteland in his mind, bleak and dark and endless.

 If Flint ( _James_ , he sneers the name even inside his own mind) returns and finds him usurping this place here in his very bed, Flint will kill him. There is little doubt in Silver’s mind of that. There can be little doubt, no doubt even, after how they left things between them. The things he did to Flint… _for_ Flint…for Madi, too. And look what came of all that?

He closes his eyes and wishes himself anywhere but here. Even back in that dank cell with the violence and pain, if it means he never has to face Flint.

 

*  *  *

 

Things Thomas knew about John Silver before he met him:

  1. He is a pirate
  2. He was a member of Flint’s crew aboard a ship called the Walrus
  3. Flint and he were in closely in step,  with a relationship of an intimate nature
  4. He betrayed his captain
  5. James still says his name in his sleep
  6. He has one leg, due to an injury that happened during their time together
  7. James clearly still cares for him
  8. He is not to be trusted



 

Things he knows now:

  1. Silver also speaks in his sleep, though Flint’s is not the only name on his lips.
  2. His eyes are very very blue
  3. He is certainly well endowed, a fact that James neglected to mention and a fact Thomas feels he has no right to know, and yet he can't forget it either.
  4. His eyes follow Thomas around the room when he’s there, as though he cannot believe the sight of him
  5. He is not to be trusted.



 

 

*  *  *

 

Silver sniffs his shirt and grimaces. He smells of sweat and fever. On some level that bothers him, but at the same time, he’s too lethargic to stir himself enough to wash. His wounds ache, and he doesn’t want to move. He wants sleep to take him again. He wants to return to his dreams. He doesn’t remember them clearly but he wants to try. Perhaps this time they'll end differently. 

“It’s time for a wash.” Thomas tells him, bringing in a basin and a cloth.

“I can live without it.” Silver says dully.

“It won’t take long.” Thomas says. “The last time-“

“The last time.” Silver repeats.

“When I washed you.” Thomas trails off, looking distinctly awkward.

“ _You_  washed me.” Silver’s voice is strained, cracking slightly in disbelief. For some reason the thought of that is appalling to him. Even before the ordeal in the cell, he had only let certain people see him naked, and now...the idea of Thomas doing is unfathomable.

“Yes.” Thomas says. It’s obvious Silver doesn’t think this was necessary from the expression on his face. “You were in no condition to do it yourself, your wounds needed tending, and, quite frankly, the stench of your clothes was appalling.”

Silver just glowers at Thomas, reaching for the cloth.

“I can manage.” He says hoarsely, and Thomas hesitates, then passes it to him .

“Very well. I’ll heat up more water.”

He gives it ample time, returning with a fresh basin of hot water to find Silver’s barely moved, the cloth still clenched in his fist, his eyes still focused on the wall. The dog watches him from his place on the floor.

Thomas sets the basin down. “If you don’t, I will.” He refrains from saying _must_. Instead he pulls slightly on the cloth in Silver’s grasp until finally Silver sighs and releases it.

He lies stiffly as Thomas bathes his chest and torso, washing around the bandage across his chest. Thomas will cross that hurdle in a moment and he’s not looking forward to it. When he reaches Silver’s hips, he hesitates again and then pulls the blanket down slowly. He waits for Silver to object, to say, that he can do this at least himself but instead Silver simply turns his head away, gazing at the wall.

Thomas works efficiently but not hastily. He barely passes the cloth over Silver’s still cock, but he still feels the tremor pass through Silver all the same. It’s not the time to tell the man of his dreams, of the way Silver reached for him in his fever.

Thomas finishes and pulls his underclothes back up. “Now.” He hesitates again.

“What now?” Silver’s voice is weary.

“I need to change the bandage on your chest and check the wounds on your back.” He expects opposition to this too, but instead Silver nods.

“Which first?”

“Which is more painful?”

He almost doesn’t expect Silver to answer that, to give him any confirmation that he’s truly in pain, but to his surprise Silver merely says, “The back.”

“Back first then, and then your chest will distract you from the pain.”

“Nothing does that.” Silver says flatly.

“Nothing?” Thomas asks, curious.

Silver’s eyes shift to him and then away as he turns, lying on his side, back to Thomas so he can tend the dressings. “What should?”

“Thinking of other things. The days ahead, and the days past.”  He inspects the wounds and breathes a sigh of silent relief. There is no sign of infection. This at least is a success.

“Is that what you did, to distract yourself from the pain?” Silver’s voice is low, oddly intimate and the distinct feeling of an unfamiliar familiarity intensifies within Thomas’s chest as Thomas realizes what he’s speaking of.

This man, this pirate, knows his past, what happened to him, which means James must have told him. His hands don’t so much as pause as he keeps working. James...no, _Flint_ shared that with Silver, when he's barely spoken of Silver to Thomas. 

“Sometimes.”

“Did it work?”

Thomas’s lips smile humorlessly. “Sometimes.” He finishes replacing the bandage. “There, that part’s done. Sit up slowly.”

Silver does, wincing but it doesn’t take as much effort as before. Another good sign.

He sits facing Thomas without looking at him, letting his gaze drift beyond Thomas’s shoulder. This is the wound that needs the most attention, though it’s closely tied with the back wounds.

Thomas is so intent on washing it carefully, and then drying the wound before he applies a new bandage. It takes him a while to notice Silver’s gaze has shifted and Silver’s looking at him intently. He looks up then, directly into Silver’s face and for a moment their eyes are locked upon each other.

Thomas half raises a hand, to touch Silver’s neck, to cup his cheek, to tell him _something_ , even though he has no words ready in this situation. Instead his hands brush the corner of Silver’s bandage and Silver draws a sharp breath.

Immediately Thomas draws back. “There.” he announces unnecessarily. “All finished.”

He leaves the room immediately, trying to look as though he’s not hurrying. The moment he’s out of sight though, Thomas sets the basin and cloth down on the table. He places his palms flat on the sturdy table, steadying himself.

Two weeks since James has been gone. Two bloody weeks. It’s no longer than the first time he left to get supplies they needed, but it’s long enough that still Thomas worries. This time is different too. This time he’s not alone.

His hands curl tightly into fists. The way Silver looks at him. The undeniable passion and fury in those eyes, the lines of his face, carrying the weight and the years, all that has happened. All the things Thomas doesn’t know.

Thomas desperately wants to know what James has told Silver, and yet he fears it at the same time. He doesn’t want to belong to the past sometimes, not that past, the past where he was convinced he was going to be left in darkness for the rest of his life, left so alone.

That wasn’t even the entirety of it. It wasn’t that that he had wished he’d died, had wished that so fervently, so that one day he could simply be reunited with James and Miranda again. It wasn’t only that. It was the sheer emptiness of those days and nights and all the lonely exhausting pain of it. The indignity of the asylum, the helplessness at being ordered about as though he weren’t in his right mind, when he had done nothing wrong but simply speak the truth that men didn’t want to hear, and love someone they didn’t think he should love.

There were times, blank, callous days when he’d thought about it. Whether it would be an escape, or simply the coward’s way out, as his father would say.

In the end, what had been the thing to take him away from all that darkness, had still been a betrayal, in its own way. The guilty conscience of Peter Ashe, who had finally come at his request. But when he had begged for news of James and Miranda, there had been none. Or rather, the news that their ship had been lost at sea. What point was there to live anymore in this event? If they were alive and well, that was one thing, but this utter devastation, tearing at his heart, was so pointless.

Peter had gone away then when they had come to restrain him. Thomas had lost track of the days before he came again. He had sunk into a despondency so deep he could barely hear the words spoken to him.

“Thomas, Thomas.” Peter had said. “You must not dwell on this.”

“Not dwell on it?” He’d repeated dully. What else was there to think about? There was nothing left. At least if they had gotten away from the foul stench of England and managed to find some measure of happiness, that would have been enough.

That time Peter goes away as well, but he comes back a third time, months later. There is no change and this time Thomas doesn’t want to hear his excuses, his needs for absolution. All he can think of is that James and Miranda are gone.

In the end, Peter does offer him something. “Perhaps a change of environment. There is a place in Savannah…”

“Why would a different prison make any difference?" Although even as he said it, Thomas knew that _somewhere_ had to be better than Bedlam. Of course, it could also be far worse, and he shrunk from that awful possibility. At least the darkness was familiar in its own terrifying way. Perhaps it would be better to stay in the asylum.

“It’s more of a reform camp.” Peter says. “It’s on a plantation. A place for men who need to escape the chains of society, who need a place to live in peace. You’d be outside. There’s fresh air and sunlight. It’s not here, Thomas.”

Peter glances around the cell, clearly uncomfortable with his surroundings and his own hand in having Thomas in them, though Thomas doesn’t particularly care about that now.

Thomas thinks about it and agrees. Because there is always the chance that his ship might sink too and he’ll be reunited with them, deep beyond the ocean’s depths, safe from the world above.

Now he knows all of that, but especially James and Miranda’s deaths, was merely another of Peter’s many lies. None of it matters now, except to remember that betrayal can come at the hand of a friend and salvation offered by those least likely to have hope of it.

 

*  *  *

 

He stays away from the bedroom for the rest of the day, though he’s close enough if Silver needs anything he could call. Silver doesn’t.

By the time it’s late afternoon, Thomas has comes to a decision. It’s better to know what Silver’s been told than to imagine it. It will make matters easier if they can be truthful with each other.

He brings in a fresh cup of tea to Silver and one for himself and sits on the stool beside the bed.

Silver eyes him over the mug, waiting for him to speak.

“I thought we could get to know each other.” Thomas starts with this. “And we could begin with what James has told you of me.”

Perhaps they should start elsewhere but he wants to know this much at least, before he can move forward.

Silver’s face is shuttered, his mouth a tight, hard line. Then, carefully, “What would that serve?”

“I think it will help, don’t you?” Thomas says just as carefully. “If we both know the other’s story.”

He’d not thought it possible for Silver’s expression to grow even blanker and yet apparently it is. He sits there, his eyes empty as the void as he gazes back at Thomas. The man has distanced himself from this place, this room, this conversation, from Thomas.

“If not…” Thomas starts to rise. “That’s…” He pauses. It’s not fine, nor alright, it’s none of those things. He struggles to find the right word. “Disappointing, I confess.”

“Disappointing?” That jerks Silver out of his blankness. “How? How the fuck is that disappointing? You don’t even know me!” Thomas, of all men, has no right to be disappointed in him.

“But I’d like to.” Thomas says gently. Is that not the point he’s trying to make here?

Silver stares at him. “Why do you want to revisit this? Surely you know what I did?”

“I’m interested in your side of the story.” Thomas merely says. He neglects to mention it will be the only version he’s actually heard. James prefers to allude to the past when he speaks of it at all. There have been details here and there but nothing concrete, nothing that forms a solid picture of what happened.

Silver wets his lips, clearly trying to think of something to dissuade him. “You might regret all the effort you’ve put into saving my life if I tell you.”

“I doubt that’s true.” Thomas takes a sip of his tea, though his hands tremble faintly. He cups his palms around the mug, steadying himself with the warmth. What if it is though? What if Silver is right? What if all this has been for nothing and he wishes he had placed a pillow over Silver’s face until he simply ceased to breathe?

Silver is silent for so long Thomas begins to think he will never answer.

“All right.” Finally Silver leans back against the half propped up pillow against the bed frame, careful not to lean too much weight upon his back. “What do you want to know?”

The betrayal is right there but Thomas isn’t ready for it. He starts instead with, “What did you think? When he first told you about me?”

 

*  *  *

 

Silver wets his lips, clearly considering what to say. He takes a sip of tea. “I thought...it made sense.”

Thomas’s brow furrows. “How?”

“You have to understand.” Silver says softly, knowing as he says it, that it’s impossible for anyone to understand what it was like to hear Flint tell this to him, after all the time spent together, the long battles, and the longer nights where Silver had dreamed of knowing Flint completely. To be offered this glimpse into his past was rarer than gold.

“Here was a man I had sailed with, schemed with, and against, fought beside...and all that time, I knew there was something driving him. Something deep within him that propelled him forwards at all times, kept him motivated even when he was exhausted, when he had lost his ship and his crew, when he was wounded. At times I thought I would never know it. What lay at the heart of it, the heart of him. Then one night he tells me his story.”

His voice has dropped low, as though he were back at that campsite in the dark, open sky over their heads, and the forest surrounding them. Sharing that bottle back and forth as Flint told him of his past. For Flint to tell him about this part of him, a truth that made so much sense once Silver knew it. All the parts of Flint he had spent so long trying to connect, and here they were laid out beneath the stars.

 

*  *  *

 

Thomas leans closer, resting his elbows on his knees, still holding his mug as he listens, his gaze resting on Silver’s face.

“And his story is this. That he was in love with a lord in England, and the lord loved him back. That he and the lord, and the lord’s wife.” There’s a wry twist to his lips there, “For a time were very happy together, until they were betrayed by a friend, handed over as a scapegoat when the lord chose to go against society’s wishes. That the lord was taken from him, before he even had a chance to stop it, or could say goodbye, and he and the lady were exiled, far from England’s shore.”

There’s a pause. Silver blinks, glancing at the mug still in his hand as though he had forgotten it. He takes a slow sip, glances at the fire, at the dog curled beside it.

“What’s its name?”

“It doesn’t have one.” Thomas says absently. “James found it in the woods half starved.” He clears his throat. “Is that all you were told?”

“I know you were sent to Bedlam.” Silver says bluntly. “I know he was told that you had died there, that you had taken your own life out of the madness and anguish of grief.”

Thomas shivers. Of all the lies, of all the cruelties, that one is so severe, even now it makes his stomach sicken. Between that, and the fact that Peter told him that they were dead, there is no forgiveness left in him.

“And out of that grief and rage and misery, was born Captain Flint.” Silver takes another sip. “That is what I know of you, Thomas Hamilton. That he held such love for you, that long after you were gone, the war of his heart raged on.”

Thomas stares at him.

Silver drops his gaze, looking oddly embarrassed. He looks down at his mug, clearing his throat.

“You asked.”

Thomas stands abruptly. “I’ll fetch some more wood for the fire.” He barely glances at the fire. It’s an excuse and they both know it as he leaves the room.

He goes out to the woodshed behind the cottage, standing there in the chill spring air. That story...hearing Silver tell it is one thing. The telling of it was mesmerizing, truth be told. But taking that story and putting it in the context of James is another. Is that what happened to him? Did he truly become Flint because of Thomas?

He sinks down and crouches in the grass.

All those years of pain and grief and misery and emptiness, with no one to reach for, no one to hold. No one to even fucking hope for. He had nearly drowned under the weight of that loss, and James had been driven to rage and war against the world. And Miranda...the absence of her, the sheer glaring loss of her from their lives is unendurable. Even now the loss of her makes Thomas want to howl with agony.

He stays there till his legs start to cramp and then stiffly makes his way back inside.

 

*  *  *

 

When he returns, with a few logs for the sake of the excuse, Silver’s still sitting up in bed, waiting for him. He glances warily at Thomas as he comes back in the room.

Thomas kneels and starts feeding the fire. “Well then.” He clears his throat, waiting to see what Silver will say next.

“Does he usually stay away this long?" Silver asks.

"It's only the second time he's gone away for supplies since we’ve been here." Thomas answers, his eyes on the fire.

He looks back to see Silver gazing at him. "Why?"

Silver just shakes his head. "Just curious." 

That, Thomas knows at least, is a lie. Silver doesn’t trust himself to be safe once Flint returns. And perhaps he’s right to do so. Perhaps he isn’t safe.

 

*  *  *

 

Things Thomas has never fully understood yet about Flint’s time on the island.

The sort of things Flint’s had to do to survive. Thomas can imagine them, and the imagining is all the worse because he doesn't have any evidence to level it against. He imagines Flint as the shadow side of James, the side he once witnessed during a street brawl. Not a brawl James had started of course, but one he certainly wasn't hesitant about ending. If he's honest, Thomas had found it rather attractive at the time, in a brutish sort of way. Now...he would have to rethink that previous opinion. He's seen too much unnecessary violence to simply ignore it or make light of it, but somehow with James it's still different, though he has no good reason or feeling or excuse as to why. Though he knows there should be for something of this nature.

The precise nature of Flint and Silver's relationship. They were partners of a sort, he knows that much, though the one time he asked, daring to use that word, James's lips had thinned and he spoke no more on the subject. It wasn't until later that Thomas thought about what he had said, and the word he had used that would elicit such a response. A response that led him to believe that there was something more to that relationship. They were lovers. They had to be. A man as charismatic and driven as James would not be alone all these years. And who would else would be his match, than a fellow pirate captain? And he would need someone who was his match, his equal in every way, before James could even begin to let him in.

It's possible this is all in his imagination and somewhere Thomas knows that, but he also knows he needs, he wants this fiction to be true. That James wasn't alone, that Miranda and he were happy together, and then later when he learned of her death...it was Silver. He needs this to be true, for James to not have been alone.

But there is still the matter of Miranda. How could James leave Miranda again and again to go out to sea? Why wouldn't he take her with him? It would have been dangerous of course, but all the same, surely it was better than leaving her so alone. Surely there were dangers in Nassau as well.

How could Flint walk away from Silver? What tragedy befell them to keep them separated? He knows James had spoken of a betrayal, but he knows nothing beyond that. What would be the thing that could keep them apart? He needs to know. How even James could do such a thing as that? After Thomas had made Miranda promise that they would take care of each other, and she had sworn to him. But it had been Miranda who had made him that promise, not James. And it had only been regarding the two of them after all, not someone new, even if it is all tangled up together inside Thomas’s mind now.

He's been alone too long, before James, and even after, but there are moments when he's here...and James is there too and still Thomas craves solitude. He had longed for it so desperately when in Bedlam. The plantation had been a welcome change, in its own way. Seeing the sun again, the breeze on his face daily. It had made him feel more real again, more so than in years. And it was there that he had heard stories, tales of the pirates who ruled the high seas. At first he had listened because it was something familiar, these same pirates had once been a link between him and James.

And then he had come face to face with Captain Flint himself.

Thomas had used to be religious. In the manner of that he believed you should help your fellow man, and those who were more fortunate should help those who were not, but when they had come to Bedlam, cell to cell, speaking of the Lord’s word and the heaven to come, he had turned away. He wanted nothing to do with a religion that let men treat others like this, a religion that allowed them to pretend it was right and just to be this cruel.

Now he's thankful for whatever trick of fate, or whim of destiny that brought him and James back together. But if he thinks such a thing is responsible, then there must also be a reason for the return of John Silver as well. Thomas simply has to learn what it is.

 

*  *  *

 

By now it’s late afternoon. The sky is a dull gray, the possibility of rain in the air. They begin the conversation again.

“Next question.” Silver says, moving on from the topic they’ve left it at. Neither of them are in a hurry to return to that particular point.

“Why do you watch me when I’m not looking?” Thomas says the first thing that comes to mind. He can’t help noticing. Whenever he looks away, and turns back, it’s to find Silver examining him.

“Because…” Silver hesitates. “At times I think I’ve gone mad. And this is what that madness has conjured up for me, being trapped here.”

“And imagining me.” Thomas says quizzically. “Why would your mind do that to you?”

To his surprise Silver almost but not quite smiles. “I imagine it thinks I deserve it.”

The _why_ is there on the tip of Thomas’s tongue again, but this time he doesn’t say it. “I’m real.” He says instead. “I’ve touched you. You’ve touched me. Surely that’s enough to convince you I am not a mere apparition.”

Silver looks at him strangely. “What?”

“I meant…” Thomas has no answer for that. He hadn’t meant to say anything, but he can hardly say _that._ “I meant, I tended your wounds, washed you, and so forth. That’s all.”

“Very well.” Silver says slowly. “What did you mean then when you said I’d touched you?”

Thomas hesitates and then confesses. "During your fever the first week, I was tired and lay down beside you in the bed. You put your hand on my cock and stroked me off." It seems crudely put, but he can't think of another way to put it.

Silver just looks at him. "Why didn't you say anything before?"

"It didn't seem important."

Silver stares at him, incredulously. "Not important?"

"I..." Thomas shakes his head. "You weren't aware of things. You were delirious with fever. It doesn't matter."

“How can you say it doesn’t matter!”

“Why does it bother you?”

“It bothers me because…” Silver pushes himself a little further upright, fingers pressing urgently into the blankets. “I like to be awake during moments like those. I like to be _aware_ of what’s happening. And above all, I prefer the other partner to have fucking wanted it.” There’s a harsh note to his voice that makes Thomas wished he’d never spoken of it. It’s all too muddled now. If he keeps speaking, if Silver pushes a little further, there’s no knowing just how far they’ll get.

“I was taken aback, yes.” He says carefully. “But it was not…” To say it, not say to say it, he wants to take away the wretchedness in Silver’s eyes, he wants his words to be taken as true. “Unwanted.” He finishes at last. “Not entirely.” He hopes it’s not a mistake to have confessed that.

Silver’s eyes darken. “What?”

“I mean, a warm hand is a stir to any cock.” Christ, he’s making it worse by trying to make it better. The fact that it was Silver, that part of it matters. It’s because it was Silver… “I didn’t stop you because I didn’t want to wake you, for fear of causing you distress in your fever. I didn’t mind it truly.”

“You didn’t mind it.” Silver says tonelessly. “You lay there and let the one-legged man touch you because he wasn’t a threat to you.”

“It wasn't like that.” Thomas says sharply.

Silver just shakes his head, rubbing his hands over his face.

“What would you have had me done?” Thomas asks helplessly.

“I’d rather I had been awake for it.” Silver snarls.

Not that he’d have changed it, not that. But that he remembers it. That Thomas understands.

 

*  *  *

 

They sit there in silence for a while. Thomas adds another log to the fire. He wonders if he should go, if they should leave it there for today, but something tells him to wait.

At last Silver sighs.  “You found me. You washed me. You tended my wounds. What else did you do that I don’t remember?”

Thomas glances quickly at Silver, expecting to see some accusation in his eyes, but there is none. Silver is truly, simply, asking the question.

“I read to you.” Thomas says at last.

Silver’s brow creases. “You read to me.” With this admission too, he’s at a loss.

“It passes the time.” Thomas says easily. “I already intended to read, I might as well do it aloud.”

Silver nods to himself, rubbing his thumb moodily against his chin. “Will you read to me now?”

“Yes.” Thomas says, when the surprise has finally left him room enough to speak.

He reaches for the book that he had put to one side the other evening. Silver settles back upon the bed. Thomas takes up his place on the stool, leaning forward as he reads.

 

*  *  *

 

                                                                       

 

*  *  *

 

It’s fresh agony, listening to Thomas read. Every moment that he lies there, Silver is reminded of the days after he first lost his leg, another time when he was ill and feverish and missing his former self terribly. Flint had read to him then. Never explained why, never told him he was going to, simply chose a book from his library and read. It had helped Silver focus on something other than the pain, a tether in this world, anchoring him to it, and to Flint, when he so easily could have slipped away.

He watches Thomas’s face, imagining him reading to Flint as he must have done. This innate kindness is still something he doesn’t fully understand and possibly never will, but the more he watches Thomas, the more Silver wants to know him better.

He’d spent a fair amount of time picturing Thomas before this, trying to imagine what he looked like. Now that he sees Thomas, now, not an image of Flint’s memory, not a relic of the past, he’s intrigued. Thomas is taller than he expected, broad shouldered, but more slender than Flint. His fair hair is pale in the sunlight, and the slight beard upon his jaw is a testament to the time that has passed, Silver guesses. Nevertheless, it suits him.

He hadn’t meant to find Thomas appealing, but nevertheless it happens. The idea of touching Thomas like that without his wanting it, fills Silver with disgust and remorse. And he still he can’t help remembering Thomas saying it wasn’t unwanted, not entirely.

He waits for Thomas to ask him about the betrayal, the tension aching more than his wounds and when Thomas doesn’t, it’s almost worse, and then he is relieved. Too relieved to speak of it. If there is a way to not speak of it, if he can leave here with just this weak and wounded, sharp-tongued version of himself with Thomas, perhaps that will be enough. He never has to know the other Silvers at all.

 

*  *  *

 

There is another week of this. Every day Silver sits up more. Every day Thomas examines and cleans his wounds. Every time he pretends he doesn’t see Silver watching his hands, just as he pretends he’s not aware every second that his hands are upon Silver’s body. It’s an impossible thing to forget. Thomas has touched few people willingly over the last decade. A few other prisoners, helping to look after them in the camp when they were ill. Having James returned to him is…he doesn’t like to use the word miracle, but he doesn’t know what else to call it. Having James step into his arms, move in his embrace, and reach for him, are all new and wondrous things. Things he’s known before, but needs to learn again. And now, every moment, he’s aware of Silver, and the way his body yearns for Silver to touch him again, and his hands aching to touch in return.

Every day they speak more, about everything and nothing, still treading carefully about the past between them, and the man who’s not there, and yet constantly present. When Silver speaks he has the curious ability to make the most understated dry statements, causing Thomas to laugh aloud. He tells stories, stories of all over, not just Nassau, but all along the Spanish Main, as well as London and Paris, stories of adventure and daring-do and piracy, but also humor and flirtation and scandal. Whereas when it’s Thomas’s turn to tell the tales, Silver listens, eyes intent upon his face, mouth twitching with suppressed laughter until he can’t hold back any longer. They make an unspoken wager of it, to see who can make the other laugh first.

Every day Silver watches Thomas check the windows, and the door, tending the house, as he tends to Silver, looking after everything in his care as he waits for Flint to return. It makes Silver think in turn of Miranda, and how she must have lived like this, waiting for Flint as well. What must that have been like? Now that he’s slowly getting to know Thomas, he finds her absence from Flint’s side even more surprising. A woman as intelligent and cunning as she must have been, and fiercely loved by both these men, surely she would have been an asset to Flint. Instead she was kept away inland, because Flint had decided it was best.

Every evening Thomas reads to Silver until it’s dark and the shadows stretch across the floor, and then he lights the lamp and keeps on reading. The dog has taken to sleeping regularly by the bed and Silver watches it as he listens, occasionally leaning a hand down to strokes its ears. All too often he falls asleep with Thomas’s voice soft and low in his ear.

Every night Thomas takes himself off to sleep in the attic, and every night he lies awake, thinking of Silver, and of Flint and there are nights he touches himself where he thinks of one or the other, and even sometimes both. The dreams he has these nights are dark and tangled, half fueled by all the pirate tales he’s heard, and half by his own imagination and fantasy.

Every night Silver lies awake waiting for the step upon the threshold heralding Flint’s return. Every morning he wakes to find Flint still gone. It can’t continue like this. _He_ can’t continue like this. The waiting is driving him mad. Every day he wants to leave, and every day he wants to stay longer.

 

*  *  *

 

One morning Thomas sleeps a little later than usual. When he finally wakes and comes down the ladder to the kitchen, he senses something is not right.

His suspicions are confirmed by going to the bedroom and finding Silver out of bed and in the process of getting dressed. Thomas leans against the door, arms folded across his chest, simply watching him. He waits until Silver’s nearly gotten his shirt over his head before he speaks.

“Where exactly do you think you’re going?”

“Fuck.” Silver nearly trips as he tries to turn and face him even though he can’t see Thomas. “Fuck.”

Thomas tries not to laugh as he steps forward. “Here, let me help.”

“I can get dressed.” Silver growls, but it still takes him a minute to pull his shirt over his head, and Thomas helps just a little with tugging it down.

Silver glares up at him. “Where do you think I’m going? I’m leaving.”

”You’re barely fit to walk to the next room.” Thomas lays a hand on the crutch. “How far to do you think you’ll get?” Perhaps Silver is a little stronger than that, he has been walking to the front room every day at least.

"I'm fit enough." Silver growls. "Let me go."

Thomas is just as obstinate, refusing to let go of the crutch. "You're not."

"Let me be." Silver pulls it back, and Thomas holds on stubbornly. “I’m stronger than I was.”

"Prove it." Thomas tells him heatedly.

"I'm strong enough to fuck you."  Silver tells him just as heatedly.

Thomas freezes, only for a moment, and then again, "Prove it." He doesn't know what makes him dare to say such a thing. He only knows he can’t let Silver leave, that he has to keep him here.

Silver simply pushes himself up, pressing his lips against Thomas's. His mouth is warm and heated and just the right amount of pressure forcing Thomas to acknowledge what is happening here, and how he's answering it, in kissing Silver back. There is something there, that he can’t examine too closely but he knows what it is. He wants to be as close to Flint as this man was. He wants to understand the gaps in their pasts. He wants to know John Silver too.

He simply _wants_ and in this moment that is enough.

Thomas leans deeper into the kiss and Silver keeps leaning up, hands seeking purchase upon Thomas’s body. He slips a hand between them, snaking downward to Thomas’s cock. Silver never takes his eyes off Thomas’s face as his hand encircles Thomas, drawing him out. His thumb presses along the head, and Thomas sucks in a breath.

There are things he’s supposed to say here. _Are you sure_ , and _this can end here._ But he doesn’t want to say them so he doesn’t. Silver slides his hand down along his length. There’s a question in his eyes and it isn’t _are you sure._ It’s something though. Thomas draws back a little, looking around the room. It’s their bedroom; he knows there’s oil somewhere and he can see Silver having the same line of thought.

At last he finds the small vial on the windowsill and brings it over to the bed. Silver’s sat on the edge of the bed, pushing his breeches and drawers down, letting them fall to the floor. Thomas undresses, still watching him. He sits on the bed beside Silver, intent on asking how he wants this. There’s been no discussion of who will… He prefers that, he likes knowing what other men prefer. There’s always both ways between James and himself. He’s curious how it will be with Silver, how it was with him and Flint.

Silver sits back, reaching for the oil. He swipes two fingers through it, and presses them between his legs. Thomas doesn’t know whether to give him privacy or to watch. He doesn’t miss the small grunt Silver utters or the slow way his body shifts to encompass his fingers.

At last he removes them and looks at Thomas. “Sit back.”

“We can lie down.” Thomas begins, his gaze still on Silver’s hands.

“ _Sit_.” Silver orders and Thomas does, letting Silver crawl onto his lap, positioning himself. He steadies Silver before he even knows what he’s doing. Silver sinks down slowly, taking him in. His fingers clench deep into Thomas’s shoulders.

Thomas lets his hands smooth over Silver’s back, holding him, steadying him. Fearful to touch because of his back, but unwilling not to touch Silver. He _needs_ to touch Silver. It’s only by holding on to Silver that he can discover that past self, the present connection and the future to come. Here in this moment, it all blurs together.

Silver makes a slightly ragged noise and Thomas looks at him quickly. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” Silver breathes. “It’s just… _you’re_.” he squints at Thomas, panting slightly. “So fucking big.”

“You’re one to talk.” Thomas bites back a smile but Silver’s already laughing faintly, and then he sinks further, and Thomas’s hands slide to his hips so he can press into Silver, holding on to him. Silver moves in a slow dreamlike state. There’s sweat traveling down his chest. This is taking some effort for him, but he maintains an even steady pace that is both perfect and infuriating.

Thomas squeezes his buttocks, bringing him even closer and Silver utters a little moan. He does it again, spreading his palms over Silver’s flesh, feeling the motion of their bodies where they’re joined, feeling the heat of Silver’s own considerable length pressing against his chest. He slips a hand between their bodies, stroking him. Silver’s chest heaves, he’s panting harder, and then he leans in to kiss Thomas.

“More.” He murmurs, his lips warm upon Thomas’s.

Thomas tightens his grip, thrusting into him, stroking him harder and Silver shudders as he does so, moving over that particular spot that makes Silver’s bones go lax and his body pliant. He tightens his grip on Thomas, as they still move together. Until Thomas can hold back no longer, spilling into Silver with a rush and a groan.

Silver’s doing this to know him too, to know that side of Flint, to reach that link between the two of them. Thomas realizes this suddenly. The way Silver’s touching him, the way his hands encircle Thomas’s body, the way he seeks more and more from Thomas with each touch. And Thomas gives it to him, wanting to give him everything he can.

Finally he slips from Silver and they lie side by side in the aftermath of silence.

"Why do you want to leave so badly?" Thomas whispers. He can feel Silver in every inch of his frame, from the bare flats of his feet to the swollen side of his lip where Silver had tugged a little too roughly with his teeth. He can feel him swelling in his brain too, taking over, sinking into the mesh, the messy crevices of Thomas's private thoughts. How has he let this happen?

 "If I stay...I have to face him." Silver's voice is rough.

 

At that Thomas turns his head and looks at him. " _That's_ why you wanted to leave?" He half pushes himself up. "You were going to leave without even speaking to him?"

Silver searches his face. "You still don't understand. You don’t know."

"Then fucking tell me!" Thomas snarls. Spittle lands on Silver's cheek and he barely flinches, still gazing up at Thomas, still trying to make sense of this.

"I betrayed him. I took his war away, and I clapped him in irons, and I sent him to Savannah." 

There's a roaring in Thomas's ears as he stares at Silver. "You... _you_ did that....why did you? Why?” How could Silver have known?

"Because I knew you were there." Silver's voice is oddly steady as he answers. "And I hoped that would be enough to make him cease." And then he sighs and his voice wavers and breaks. "And in the end, it wasn't enough. He'll never let go of that betrayal."

Thomas has no words. He can’t think. He’d known it had to be something, but this, the entirety of it, is too much to think of altogether.

He looks at Silver, Silver who’s lying there sprawled and still sweating, looking at the roof with an odd expression. Thomas wants to know if he regrets it, if he regrets any of it, when Silver speaks again.

“It’s possible I was mistaken.” His voice is slightly fainter than it was before.

Thomas looks at him sharply. He puts a hand to Silver’s forehead and it’s far too hot. “Damnit, you’ve brought your fever back.”

“I rather think we did that.” Silver murmurs drowsily. His eyes are already half closed.

Thomas curses himself, and Silver, as he goes to fetch a basin of water. He should have known better. He knows Silver wasn’t well. That was the whole point.

It takes him until he’s filling the pitcher to see the funny side of it and Thomas starts laughing, if a little hysterically.

“Well I’ve certainly proved you’re in no condition to leave.” He tells Silver when he returns. Silver makes no response. He’s already lost to sleep, skin still hot but his breathing is steady at least. Thomas studies him as he bathes his face. He wonders what they’ve done.

He touches Silver’s hair, gazing at him. “I know why you sent him to Savannah.” He says softly. He may not know everything pertaining to the rest of it, but that he knows. “I know you loved him.”

 

*  *  *

 

Silver drifts. He’s dimly aware of Thomas bathing his face, but has no strength to speak. He knows he’s committed a second betrayal, further distancing himself from even the slightest possibility of Flint’s absolution. On the one hand, that might be exactly why he did it. And on the other hand, he knows it’s more complex than that, because of Thomas.

 _He'll never forgive me_ , is Silver's one thought. _He'd never have forgiven me before and he can never forgive me now for being with Thomas._ He's doubly damned himself, and yet he can't regret either course of action. It's too late for regret.

He keeps his eyes closed and waits for the dreams to come.

 

*  *  *

 

Thomas lies beside Silver, but barely sleeps, keeping watch over Silver to make sure his fever doesn’t worsen. As he watches Silver sleep, he thinks of what Silver’s done. Was that the whole of it? Was that enough to cause the rift between him and James? He could see that.

In the last two years he had become more than a little enamored with the tales of the pirates, more than a little obsessed with the legend of Captain Flint and the mysterious John Silver. Fitting together the truth of those tales, the knowledge that Silver is real, that James truly knew him was a revelation. And now here he is, with the final piece of the mystery told and Thomas thinks of James, wishing he were here so that he could still further understand.

 

*  *  *

 

In the morning Silver stirs and looks over to find Thomas on the other side of the bed.

Thomas’s eyelids flutter open.

 “Ask.” Silver murmurs sleepily.

Thomas hesitates. “Was it...solely for James?” It would be enough if it was, but something tells him there’s still more.

“No.” Silver says reluctantly and Thomas watches his eyes shift. “I did it for Madi too.”

They lie there in the wide bed and Silver tells Thomas about her, the daughter of a queen, with the heart of a warrior, and the courage of a lion. “I thought if I could only keep her safe, keep them both safe... it would be enough.”

Thomas thinks of how James leaves him here alone, of how he tries to keep him safe now. “It’s not enough.”

Silver looks at him in surprise, sees the expression in his eyes. “No. No, it’s not enough.”

He wants to ask if Thomas will tell Flint what’s happened, but somehow he can’t bring himself to say those words.

Eventually Thomas stretches slightly and slips from the bed with the promise of tea. Silver lies there a while longer, watching day break softly through the window.

  
  
*  *  *

_Part 2: A few days later..._

 

There is a lamp shining brightly through the window, and Flint draws closer, finding himself looking through the half drawn curtains, to see Thomas standing by the sideboard. Flint takes this moment to contemplate the man that even now he hardly dares believe is alive.

It’s been nearly a month since he left. Half the reason Flint allows himself to go on the supply runs, or finds any excuse to leave at all, is so that he can come back and find Thomas there again. It's a repetitive exercise in joy and pain, for so far every time Thomas has been there, and yet he still finds himself waiting for the day he is not.

Flint knows he stays away too long, and yet there is always the compulsion to do so. The weight of missing Miranda is even heavier when he’s with Thomas. He feels himself reliving the past in his mind, all the things he could have done differently that would have brought about a different outcome and yet he failed to do so.

Tonight, Thomas turns and looks towards the fire, saying something over his shoulder. This is the moment Flint realizes there is someone else in the room. He glances towards the fireplace as well and his heart turns cold.  

There sitting in the chair is a figure he knows well. The man, the myth, the monster of all those stories they helped grow and spread across the sea...there he is. John Silver in the flesh. Sitting before the fire, staring into the flames, shoulders hunched, yet his head is cocked so Flint can tell he's listening.

Silver is sitting there, listening to Thomas.

Flint can't hear over the roaring of the ocean in his ears. He watches Thomas say something else and go into the kitchen. Silver leans forward to poke idly at the fire. The dog is sleeping beside his foot.

Flint moves to the door, nudging it open silently. He has his knife out, fitting neatly to his palm as he crosses the room like a shadow. He’s over to the chair before Silver can even move.

"Tell me what the fuck you are doing here." His voice rasps as he gazes down at Silver, his knife to Silver’s throat.

Silver stills, looking up at him. His eyes meet Flint's and then dart away again, seeking refuge elsewhere. The dog whines and Flint ignores it.

"Answer me." Flint snarls. "Why are you here?" He never expected this. He never thought he'd ever see Silver again. Not here. Not now, not...not with Thomas.

"I never meant." Silver starts, and then cuts himself off as Flint's fingers move involuntarily, pressing the knife harder to his throat, the blade against Silver’s soft flesh.

"If you leave now before he comes back, I might even let you live." Flint whispers, watching the way Silver considers the offer. He doesn't mean it. He'll follow Silver from the house and cut his throat once it's safe enough to do so, far away from the eyes of Thomas.

"I never meant to." Silver says at last.

There's something about it that makes Flint want to believe him even though he knows better. He knows what it is to trust Silver, and the mistake it is.

"James."

Flint jerks his head up, but his hand is still steady, gripping the knife, as he looks at Thomas there in the doorway.

"He's not a threat, James." Thomas sounds so mild, as though it's an affront to see a knife here in their sitting room.

"You don't know him." Flint says coldly. It's probably his imagination, but he thinks he sees Thomas wince a little.

"James, please." Thomas takes a step forward. "What I mean is-"

"What he means is I'm hardly capable of being a threat to you at the present." There's a harsh mirth to Silver's voice as he looks up at Flint.

And now Flint truly looks at him, taking in the sight of the man before him.

Silver looks like a former version of himself, a shadow. His very frame seems smaller somehow, his shoulders curved slightly inward as he leans back against the chair. His wrists are appallingly thin as they rest upon the arms of the chair, hands clenched. And belatedly too, Flint sees the bandage through the open shirt he's wearing. Someone cut a broad swath across that lean chest with the intent to wound deep.

It shouldn't matter. It doesn't matter. It makes no difference at all, and yet he lowers the knife and turns away.

Thomas exhales slowly. "James, can we..."

"Kitchen, now." He strides past him. He doesn't like leaving Silver alone, but there's nothing for it. He's not talking to Thomas in front of the man for christsake.

Thomas follows him and waits, standing there, arms crossed, watching him. The dog has followed them at least, whining softly. Flint views it with narrowed eyes. How has Silver won the animal over? How did he persuade Thomas to let him in the door?

"What the fuck is he doing here?" Flint demands, pacing in agitation. He never imagined coming back to this. Silver. Here. Alive. What the fuck happened to him? Who did those things to him? Flint feels his nails digging into his palms, and looks down, realizing his hands have formed fists of their own volition. He forces his palms to loosen, to let his hands still.

Thomas blinks. "He was wounded, _is_ wounded, I should say, and he needed help."

"That doesn't explain why he's here in the first place." There is no good explanation for that. He simply can’t fathom the reality of it. Even now it feels like a dream. He could turn and go back into the next room and it would be empty, the phantom faded away before the fire like it was never there, no matter how often Flint’s dreamed of him returning.

"Nevertheless," Thomas's voice is dry as kindling. "He is here."

"Did he explain the wounds, any of it?"

"Some, but not much." Thomas says reluctantly.  "He's nearly as close-mouthed as you."

That stops Flint in his pacing. He pivots to look at Thomas. "And what exactly is that suppose to mean?" There's an edge to his voice and it takes Thomas aback for a moment, Flint can see it in Thomas's eyes. It's not how they usually speak to each other. It's not how James would let himself speak to Thomas.

Flint though is different.

"It means we haven't exactly spoken a great deal since our reunion." Thomas says at last. "Especially about the years missing between us." There’s no accusation in his words, and yet it feels exactly like that.

"And you thought letting John Silver into our home would remedy that."

"I thought he was a man bleeding on our doorstep and he needed help. I didn't realize who he was until later."

Flint has so many questions, but there are no answers for them here, unless he questions Silver himself, so he turns back to the front room.

"James." Thomas says his name softly, almost unsure. Flint hates that he's put that uncertainty into his voice, but he has nothing to reassure him with, not yet.

 

*  *  *

 

He steps back into the other room. For once Silver hasn't moved. His hands are still clenched against the arms of the chair, his gaze on the fire. He looks up quickly as Flint approaches, tensing.

"How did you know we were here?" Flint raps out the question.

Silver hesitates.

"Thomas seems to have some objection about leaving you to bleed out." Flint says pleasantly enough. "I have no such compunction."

To his surprise there's the slightest hint of a smile curving upon Silver's lips. "At least some things remain the same." He says softly.

"Silver." Flint warns, even as he feels Thomas draw closer in his peripheral vision.

Silver merely sighs faintly, and leans his head back, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes. "I believe Madi knew."

"Madi?" Flint repeats. "Why..." Why would Madi knew, and why would she care, and why would that explain anything? and yet...he can connect the dots, one by one, except for the part that it still makes no sense.

"I believe Madi knew, but that is as much as I know. I was not..." His eyes flit to Thomas for a moment. "In the best of health  when I arrived."

"He was out of his mind with fever." Thomas says, coming closer. "It died down thankfully after a week or so." He pauses there, as though he’s about to say something more, and then stops.

"A week!" Flint looks at him, surprised. "How long has he been here?"

"Nearly a month." Again, there’s no accusation and yet all Flint can hear is ‘all the time you were gone.’

Flint's hands curl into tight fists once more. All this time. Silver has been here all this time under their roof.

"Believe me, I tried to leave." Silver mutters.

Thomas makes some involuntary gesture out of the corner of his eye, but all Flint hears are the words Silver just uttered.

" _Believe_ you?"

Silver goes silent and still under the open force of his wrath.

"Believe _you_." Flint snarls, moving in to press his hands down upon the chair arms, gripping Silver's wrists tightly, imprisoning him there. "You have the audacity to _sit_ there and tell _me_ to fucking _believe_ you?"

Silver stares back at him. His face is mere inches from Flint's. Flint can see the heavy lines around his eyes and mouth that weren't there before, age and violence and time, on a face still too young for all of those things. It hasn’t been long enough for this to have happened. It hasn’t even been a year since they were parted. His gaze lingers on Silver's mouth, an aspect of him that Flint has studied well over time. A thought passes through his mind, a thought he's had before, that his thumb would fit well in the crease of Silver's lower lip. How easy it would be to crush that lip, or to kiss it.

He closes his eyes for a half moment.

"I'm not telling you to believe me." Silver murmurs. "I'm asking."

Flint's eyes open again. Silver's still there. Of course he’s still there. He’s not considerate enough to be a ghost. He had to return in physical form, to haunt Flint with his very being.

Flint steps back. "Answer the question."

"I told you. Madi knew."

"That doesn't explain you being here."

Silver shoots a look at Thomas.

"Don't look at him, look at me." Flint snarls.

"I've told him," Silver says unperturbed. "That I don't fully remember arriving here. I was wounded and feverish. I was traveling somewhere...and..." He trails off helplessly, or an attempt to look helpless, Flint can’t discern which it is and that bothers him. Before he would have known, would have been able to see through the cracks in Silver’s tale, the tics that give him away. It’s been too long.

"How'd you get the wounds?" Flint asks next.

"I was captured by the Spanish." Silver says shortly, looking away. He stares at the fire.

"And?" Flint prods, when he doesn't say anything more.

"As you can imagine, they were rather pleased to get their hands on the infamous Long John Silver. They still had questions as to what happened to that cache."

"And did you tell them?" Flint says soft as a breeze in the darkness.

"No." Silver says just as quietly.

Flint exhales slowly. He's not even sure what he expected or wanted Silver to say in response to that. Even if Silver had told them of the island, he still doesn’t know the precise location. But the island would have been a start, it would have been easy to surrender that information.

"Which is why they kept torturing him." Thomas says into the silence.

Flint looks at him, and then back at Silver. "What?'

"You thought he was wounded in a fight, or trying to escape, didn’t you? That's not the case."

"Well, part of the original wound was in a fight." Silver puts in and then quickly subsides when he sees the look Thomas gives him. Moreover Flint sees the look Thomas gives him. It's a far too intimate look somehow. Both exasperated and yet, if Flint didn't know any better, he might call it fond. The thought is too puzzling.

"What exactly happened here while I was gone?" He asks because something has clearly happened, but he has no idea what. He's certain of it after the silence that follows is a little too long.

"He let me in." Silver says easily. "Isn't that enough?"

"James." Thomas says. "I've been tending his wounds, which are not few. I've tended him alone since I could hardly leave him to fetch a doctor. He's not yet recovered enough to leave, which is a point that Mr. Silver and I happen to differ upon." There's a finality to his words that Flint hasn't heard in years. It used to mean that Lord Hamilton was finished with this topic of conversation and it would not be revisited again unless he decided so.

Lord Hamilton might be, but Captain Flint is not.

Flint paces. "How long before he is?”

"A few more weeks at the very least."

Flint stares at him incredulously. "Are you seriously suggesting we let him stay for that long?"

"What's the alternative?" Thomas demands.

"I told you I was fit to leave." Silver begins.

"Don't start." Thomas says without looking at him. Again that prickle of familiarity jabs at Flint. How are they like this? After only a month? How did they reach this point?

"Enough." Flint says. He's tired. He wants a bath. He wants a meal. He wants...Thomas. That weary thrum of desire courses through him. Usually when he comes back, they go to bed, losing themselves in the necessary physical affirmation of each other’s presence.

He's not going to think about sex with Silver in the next room. He's done enough of that already. He's had enough of barely _thinking_ about sex with Silver in the same room to last a lifetime, for fuck's sake. It's far too easy to think of.

He doesn't particularly like the idea of fucking Thomas with Silver next door either, or above them in the attic...which would be difficult to get to in Silver's condition if he is as badly off as Thomas seems to think. Which leaves precious few places to sleep.

He looks again at Silver and then Thomas. "Where exactly has he been sleeping?"

Thomas has the grace to look abashed at this, which confirms his worst suspicions.

Silver on the other hand has the faintest smirk on his face and Flint thinks about how good it would be to curl his fingers deep into his throat and squeeze. Has it always been like this? The violence between them? Or is it because of the time that has passed, the time and the betrayal and the absence...

It reminds him not a little of how he felt at the beginning, when he first set eyes on Silver. It feels like a hundred years ago.

"He was wounded." Thomas says. "Where else was I supposed to put him?"

Flint sighs. "I need a drink."

He leaves them there by the fire and goes into the kitchen to find the bottle of whisky he tucked away in the corner of a cupboard. He pours himself a full glass, drinking down half of it.

"Is it really that bad to have him here?" Thomas asks from behind him.

"You wouldn't ask me that if you knew."

"To do that you would have had to tell me." Thomas says quietly.

“Don’t start.” Flint says, and there again the familiarity of his words braced against the way Thomas spoke to Silver. He knows there is something more. Is it merely the presence of Silver? Worming his way in here too, long after Flint had put the past behind him?

 _That’s a lie_ , the voice whispers, _you’ve never put the past behind you. You excel at doing the exact opposite._

He ignores the voice, as he always does. It used to sound different, it’s taken on different tenors over the years, different faces. Now it’s just a voice in the dark.

“I’m merely trying to…” Thomas pauses. “I couldn’t leave him out there. You wouldn’t have left him out there. You wouldn’t have left a dog out there.” _You didn’t leave a dog out there_ , is what he wants to say. _You found that dog hurt in the woods, and brought it back to be tended and looked after. You couldn’t let the dog die._

Flint looks at him. “I know that. I understand that. I understand what you did. What I’m trying and failing to understand here is what he’s doing now.”

“I don’t know.” Thomas says earnestly. “But something brought him to our door.”

He draws closer and Flint can feel the warmth in him, the realness of him. He’s here. He’s alive. Once again he’s come back and once more Thomas has been waiting. How many more times can Flint test this before he believes it to be true?

Thomas puts his arms around him and Flint breathes in the scent of him. He used to dream of this, of being so close to Thomas that all he has to do is turn his head and find his mouth waiting to be kissed.  

“You should have seen him.” Thomas murmurs. “He was so weak…I thought he was going to die.”

Flint feels shaken by the statement. He never thought he would have to be involved with the nature of Silver’s death ever again, but just hearing about the possibility of it gives him a peculiar feeling in his chest. He’d thought….

He’d thought this was _done_. That they were done. That he would never again be close enough to watch Silver swallow down his words, and have the desire to set his mouth against his skin there, to feel that movement upon his lips, to taste his thoughts made reality. He’d put those desires behind him a long time ago.

He leans into Thomas again, pressing his mouth to the nape of Thomas’s neck. God, he needs this. The physical reassurance that Thomas is here, and he is here.

The trouble is Silver is also here, sleeping in their bed. Flint pushes the thought away immediately. Silver has no place being there.

He manages to step back, not meeting Thomas’s gaze, not wanting to see the surprise in his eyes.

“Where are we supposed to sleep then?”

“I’ll make up a pallet by the fire out there.” Thomas says.

“Fine.” Flint says curtly. “I’ll bring in the supplies.”

 

*  *  *

 

By the time he’s finished, the fire has died down a little, and Silver is gone from the front room. Flint glances at the bedroom but the door is closed. There’s a pallet spread upon the floor, along with their spare blankets. It will do, but Flint doesn’t want to sleep here before the fire. He wants to be in his own bed with Thomas.

He kneels resentfully by the fire, adding another log. The dog crouches beside him, and he scratches its ears absentmindedly, forgiving it for its momentary lapse of loyalty. It’s just a stray after all. Naturally it would be drawn to Silver.

Finally he removes his boots and stretches out, gazing at the fire. Thomas comes to lie beside him. There’s a moment of silence and then Flint turns and presses his face to the side of Thomas’s neck. “I’m sorry I was gone so long.”

It’s not enough. He knows that. But it’s all he has for now.

“I know.” Thomas whispers, kissing his hair. “I know.”

 

*  *  *

 

In the morning Flint almost thinks he’s dreamt it, but no, here they are sleeping by the fire, and in the other room, in their bed, is Silver.

Thomas is already awake, in the kitchen. Flint goes to stand in the doorway, watching him.

Thomas looks up from the kettle he’s hanging over the fire. “Good morning.”

Flint nods. He wants to speak, to say something but here in the kitchen with the kettle whistling and the fire burning, and Thomas there in his sleep shirt, it seems impossible. Instead he goes to wash the sleep from his eyes and the moment is gone.

 

*  *  *

 

Every day Flint finds excuses to leave the cottage. Not far, he can’t bring himself to go far now. For once he’s stepped beyond the threshold, he’s filled with a terrible longing to return and see how Thomas is faring, to see what Silver is up to.

The questions are countless, lining up one after another in his mind. How is Madi, how did she handle the end of the war – he can only imagine- and yet she rescued Silver from the Spanish. That must certainly mean something.

He misses the sea. Seeing Silver brings that back the strong salt spray to his nostrils. Being inland where they are, there is no salt, there is only the quiet of the forest and the low calling of the birds hidden in the tall trees.

Flint hates it here, but it’s still the safest place right now. He told himself that he could bear anything as long as Thomas remained safe. He wonders now if that’s still true.

 In the evenings he’s forced to return. Thomas and he eat their meals, more often than not in silence, both of them well aware of the man in the next room. The slightest sound sets them both on edge.

 

*  *  *

 

There’s the time there’s a crash and a dull thud, the sound of Silver swearing, and Thomas is up before Flint can stop him. When he reaches the door, a few seconds behind, Flint pauses.

Silver’s sitting on the side of the bed, shirt drawn up to his hips, pulling at his breeches, but not before Flint catches a glimpse of pale white skin, and dark curls and, well, the rest of him.

Flint swallows and looks away. Watching instead, Thomas cleaning up the spilled piss from the chamber pot.

“I said leave it.” Silver says tiredly.

Thomas just shakes his head. “If you need help…just say something.”

Silver looks up and catches Flint’s gaze. There’s a moment, and some trace of understanding passes between then. Flint knows Silver has no intention of asking for help, and Silver knows that he knows it.

 

*  *  *

 

There’s the afternoon that Flint returns and Thomas is out of the cottage. Flint feels on dangerous territory knowing only Silver is there alone. He’s been getting stronger, walking out to sit in the large armchair for a portion of the afternoon, before returning to the bedroom later in the evening.

Here Flint finds him, sitting before the fire, lost in thought.

Flint leans in the doorway, watching him. It’s been three days and he’s still trying to make sense of Silver’s presence here.

“Why did you come here?” Flint asks brusquely. The eternal question. Will Silver ever give him an answer that satisfies?

“With all honesty, I never intended to.” Silver looks at him, catches the eye roll. “I know how that sounds but this time it’s the truth. When I was in that cell, when Madi rescued me she knew I needed somewhere to go, and she entrusted two of her men to take me there, and that was that.”

“And here was this?”

“Here.” Silver says feebly. “This was the only place I could think of. I...convinced the men to leave me at the edge of the forest, or tried to, and then finally I convinced them to leave me at the gate so I could make my own way in.”

“But why here?” Flint presses.

_Because I thought I was dying in that cell and the thought of dying without seeing you again, even if you were still angry, even if you never forgave me...haunted me._

“I don’t know.” Silver murmurs.

He can’t tell Flint about that feverish moment of weakness for if he were to do that, it would open a door on all that could never be. The moment he had been clear-headed again, he’d known he needed to get away from here as quickly as possible before Flint returned.

It’s not only the fear and the certainty that Flint will kill him, though that should have been enough. No, the secret dreadful fear is that he will open his mouth and confess something that was never meant to be seen in the light of day, for it was never meant to be felt or acknowledged at all. Even now he’s still a coward. Silver acknowledges this to himself. If it means telling Flint he loves him, he’d rather slit his own throat.

There is, after all this, the matter of Thomas too. Thomas to whom he’s almost irresistibly drawn. He’s known how to conceal his feelings from Flint for years. This new desire takes getting used to. This concealment takes work, and he’s already exhausted. Every moment Thomas is in the room, he fears Flint has only to glance between them to see what was occurred.

Flint watches him and he watches Flint, and wonders what the final outcome will be this time.

 

*  *  *

 

"How're your wounds?" Flint asks gruffly, breaking the silence they’ve fallen into.

Silver eyes him. "Are you asking so that you know which one to aim for?"

Flint smiles mirthlessly. "I'm simply asking."

"They ache." Silver says half closing his eyes.

"Why didn't you tell them what they wanted to know?" Flint asks after a moment. "Surely it could have ended it?” He knows why Silver didn’t tell them when they took his leg. That was different. He wasn’t protecting anyone here.

"You'd think I would have learned my lesson last time wouldn't you?" Silver sighs.

“I thought you learned more than that, to be honest.” Flint’s tone is frank.

Silver’s eyelids open a fraction. “Did you?” They gaze at each other and Flint thinks again, how vulnerable Silver looks now. How easy it would be to place a hand on Silver’s shoulder and examine for himself how thin he is, and again he holds back from reaching for him.

Flint licks his lips and shrugs. “I suppose I could be mistaken.”

There’s the twitch of a smile upon Silver’s lips and it makes Flint’s heart ache. It’s too easy, slipping back into how they used to talk to each other. It makes him long for things that are impossible.

He can’t believe Silver is here, sitting in this chair beside him. It doesn’t feel possible, even now. It’s not _fair_ for Silver to come back now. Not when he’s still unsteady, lost in the past. If it had been a few years from now, Flint could see himself facing this with a cool head and a  calm hand. Now...now he wants to reach out and touch Silver’s hand, to reassure himself once and for all that that he is here, that these last few days haven’t been a dream.

He would know what to say to Silver, if it was then. He would be less angry, less muddled, more inclined to forgive, perhaps.

But it’s now, Silver’s here now, and he can’t think past all the memories.

 

*  *  *

 

That night Flint can’t sleep. The fire is still bright enough that he can see Thomas’s profile, and can tell he’s not asleep either. Slowly Flint reaches out a hand and gently touches Thomas’s cheek.

Thomas turns his head to look at him, a question in his eyes. Flint answers it by leaning in to kiss him. He feels Thomas respond, lets his hand slide down inside Thomas’s shirt, touching his chest.  

Their kissing grows more heated and Flint’s hand slides further, stroking Thomas’s cock.

“I thought you didn’t want to.” Thomas murmurs when Flint draws back. He glances at the closed bedroom door. “What if he’s awake?”

“If he’s awake, let him hear.” Flint says and sinks down between Thomas’s thighs. Normally he could spend hours upon this, tasting and teasing Thomas’s cock until Thomas is well past being teased and has to fuck him right then.

But tonight he wants it too much to wait. He only needs Thomas to be hard and it doesn’t take long with Thomas’s fingers in his hair, Thomas watching him.

There’s a brief pause while Flint goes into the kitchen to fetch some oil, but when he comes back and sees Thomas spread out upon the pallet, firelight dancing upon his skin, Flint sucks in a breath.

He crawls atop Thomas, kissing him slowly, taking his time with this, letting his body melt into Thomas’s. He can feel Thomas’s cock pressing against his belly and lets it, anticipating the pleasure that is to come.

“Are you ready?” Thomas whispers as he slicks himself and Flint nods.

Thomas’s hands clasp his face, and then slide over his neck, down his back as Flint sinks slowly down upon his cock. Flint’s eyes shutter half closed and for a moment, out of habit, he’s quiet, containing all the sounds that come naturally to him. And then he opens his mouth and lets them spill forth.

Thomas’s hands tighten upon him, grasping his body more hungrily as Flint groans aloud. This is what he needed, this unabashed pleasure, the insatiable urge for Thomas’s body, for Thomas to touch him and be touched in return, and care not if the world hears.

Well, not really the world. Just one man.

 

*  *  *

 

Silver listens to the sounds coming from the next room with an almost uncontrollable urge to laugh. If he were still fevered, he would definitely think this hell itself, designed to torment him personally.

There’s another deep-throated groan from the front room and his chest constricts. Flint. He’s always wondered what Flint would sound like, what he would taste like and hearing it secondhand, is agony.

It’s also unbearable arousing. His cock has been stirred to life, first by the sounds and then with the knowledge itself of who exactly is making those sounds. Flint and Thomas together. He shuts his eyes, but that’s worse. Unbidden he pictures them. Thomas flat on his back, Flint astride his thighs, fucking himself on Thomas’s cock. He can picture it so easily.

Silver stifles a moan. He shoves a hand underneath his blanket, giving in at last. Taking himself in hand, he listens, breath as ragged as though he himself were involved.

He thinks of Madi and all the times they slipped away from the camp, desperate to be with each other. He remembers too, telling her of Flint, and the look in her eye after he had done so. Had she known then, what he was only beginning to understand? That what he felt for Flint encompassed everything and more?

It’s too much. Silver’s hips stutter, his cock jerks feverishly in his grasp and he spills at last over his own fist, biting back a groan of his own that would have given himself away.

He waits till everything is quiet in the other room before daring to slip from the bed and hobble to the wash basin. He thinks of Thomas as he washes himself, and his skin grows warm again. Will Thomas tell Flint of what they’ve done? Surely he must. And yet, supposing he doesn’t. Supposing he keeps that a secret between the two of them, and Flint never has to know Silver’s betrayed him a second time.

Silver gets back into bed and lies there in the dark, listening to the quiet rhythm of his own heart.

 

*  *  *

 

Thomas is also lying awake. There is something about their coupling just now that bothers him slightly. It felt as though Flint had initiated it not solely for the desire of the act, for the desire of him, but something else.

He watches Flint’s profile in the dying firelight. The way his head is angled slightly towards the bedroom door, as though he were listening for something.

It comes to Thomas then. Flints wanted Silver to hear. He wanted him to know what he was missing, knowing Silver had no choice but to lie there and listen to them fucking.

 

*  *  *

 

Thomas might have been tempted to let it go, to think it was his imagination, but the next afternoon when Flint kisses him, pushing him back against the wall of the front room, sinking to his knees to mouth at Thomas’s cock, Thomas can’t let himself be distracted. No matter how much he would like to.

Thomas pushes at his shoulders “Stop. What are you trying to do here?”

“I was trying to get you off.” Flint says, sitting back at his heels. “But apparently I’m failing.”

Thomas gazes down at him and then his eyes narrow. “You’re still trying to make him jealous. That’s what you’re trying to do. Admit it.”

“What’re you talking about?” Flint pushes himself to his feet.

“You’ve barely touched me all week, we sleep side by side almost as though we were strangers, and now, you start wanting to go at it like we’re…” Thomas shakes his head. “Admit it, you’re intentionally doing this because of him.”

"Hang on." Flint says. "Why would I want to make Silver jealous?"

Thomas pauses. "Because the two of you were..." He breaks off at the sight of Flint's face. "Weren't you?"

"No." It’s Flint’s turn to pause then. “Is...is that what you thought?” He turns this information over in his mind, trying to make sense of it. Thomas seeing the connection between Silver and him and rationalizing it to that point is so decidedly Thomas, he nearly smiles.

“No.” Thomas says, and for the first time Flint knows that he is lying. “Well, not exactly. I…”

“Tell me what you thought then.”

“All right. You’re right. I thought you were lovers.” Thomas says honestly.

“We were never like that.” Flint says, aware of even then how close it exists to a lie. They were so close to that. They might as well have been that. It would have changed everything and nothing. There were nights he’d dreamed of that with Silver and for a time he’d thought Silver had as well, but then they had gone to the maroon camp and Silver met Madi, and there were other things to consider, plenty to busy himself with. There was very little time to mourn the loss of what never was. Too much grieving of things he’d truly lost.

There’s a peculiar look on Thomas’s face. “You and Silver truly never...”

Flint starts to shake his head, but then Thomas says “fucked.” And the weight of it, how he says it, leads Flint to believe that, for whatever reason, Thomas has given some careful thought to this.

“No. We never fucked.” Saying the words aloud makes him aware of just how close they were though.

“How is that possible?”

At the incredulity in Thomas’s voice, in his very expression, Flint finds he has to laugh. “It’s surprisingly easy to distract yourself when you’re in the middle of a war.” There were long nights yes, but there was also exhaustion and multiple battle points and strategies to consider and men to maneuver.

“That didn’t stop Silver and Madi.” Thomas points out.

Flint frowns. “How do you know that?” There were obvious implications, Silver must have told him and yet, why would he do that?

“Silver...well, talks to me.”

Flint snorts. “That's rich considering how little he talked to me.” It’s a petty thought, but it slips out all the same. He will never forget that day on the bluffs, the look in Silver’s eyes when he couldn’t tell his story in return.

“Well maybe you should have fucked him.” Thomas says tartly, and then stops abruptly, color rising high in his cheeks.

There’s a silence gathering in the room. Flint lets himself think very carefully before he speaks next. There’s every chance that it was a passing reference simply to the fact that Thomas had thought they already had fucked. It can’t mean…

Can it?

“Does that mean what I think it does?” There’s no way it can, and yet he remembers those odd moments when he knew something had passed between Silver and Thomas. That fleeting sense of missing something, like walking into a room moments after a conversation had ended and feeling its lingering intimacy in the air.

“I thought you two had!” Thomas hisses. “I never would have if, if I had known…”

Flint stares at him incredulously. “Are you truly saying that you and Silver…” He can’t believe this. There’s no possible way this has happened.

“Just once.” Thomas says, and then there’s a moment where again Flint thinks _he’s fucking lying to me._ It’s such an odd thought, he can barely entertain it.

“What were you thinking to just fuck him even the once?”

“I was thinking…” Thomas leans against the wall, his face lined with exhaustion. “That I was lonely, that you and I hadn’t…really touched each other in a while. Not as before.  And I thought that he was a glimpse of a part of you that I desperately wanted to know, even while I was wary of it. I was thinking…I _wasn’t_ thinking. I simply _needed_. James, I’m sorry but I needed that moment of connection. I needed him.”

“Because I wasn’t there.” Flint says blankly.

“Yes...no. it’s not just that.” Thomas says in frustration. “It’s _him_. There’s something about him that I find …intriguing. I can’t explain it.”

Flint just starts to laugh helplessly. This is the goddess of irony laughing at him, here. There is something unbearably poetic about this nonsensical part of the story unfolding in front of him. Of course Thomas is fascinated by Silver. Of course, he is.

“James?”

He can’t speak. What is there to say?

“I need...” He rubs at his forehead, words failing him. “I’ll be back.”

 

*  *  *

 

Thomas watches him go out the kitchen door and through the garden before he turns to the bedroom. He opens the door to find Silver leaning by the bed, clearly waiting to be confronted.

“Did you hear any of that?” Thomas demands.

“A little.” Silver says carefully.

Thomas stalks into the room, pacing back and forth.  He can’t believe this, any of it. How had he been so foolish?

“You let me believe the two of you were lovers.” He looks at Silver, who has the grace to look slightly regretful at least, if not ashamed.

“You already believed it.” Silver murmurs. “I just…didn’t tell you that you were wrong.”

Thomas snorts. All too easy apparently. “Why? Why would you do that?” How could he have been so wrong? He’d thought…he’d thought he’d gotten to know Silver over the past month, and now he’s not sure of anything at all.

“Do I really need to spell it out for you?” Silver shakes his head. “Very well. I wanted you. I wanted to fuck you. And you seemed more drawn to me once you assumed Flint and I had been well...Flint and I.”

“You’re an idiot.” Thomas says hoarsely.

“That’s been said before.” Silver admits. “Though not recently.”

“I was always drawn to you.” It’s true though, there’s no denying the truth in what Silver’s saying. That in knowing that Flint and Silver had been together had made him ache with longing, jealousy yes, but a jealousy of that closeness of their minds as well as their bodies. To be intimate with someone’s thoughts was a rare pleasure, a privilege of the highest regard, and Thomas missed that. He had wanted to recapture that, and Silver had been drawn to him as well in return. There’s no denying that either.

Now Silver just looks at him oddly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I mean that this could have, easily would have happened if I hadn’t been under the misapprehension that I was.” Thomas tells him wearily.

He needs to be alone as well, he needs to think. He regrets hurting Flint and he knows that he did, but all the bitterness and frustration and anger that he’s kept buried for so long rises up in him again. All the times Flint’s left him and expects Thomas to sit patiently at home and wait for him, just as he had done with Miranda.

A wave of grief hits him again, god he will never see her again, never not miss her.

He turns away, leaving Silver standing there, goes to the front door and out through the first grove of trees. The days are finally warmer. The late spring slowly bringing the flowers that were promised. He just walks among the trees, till the cottage is out of sight in the afternoon sunlight.

Only then Thomas simply sinks to his knees, a low sob escaping his throat and another. The pain of the grief is overwhelming and physical, passing through his body in heavy waves. He clasps blindly at the tree to steady himself and then the rage rises up and he smashes his fist into the trunk. The pain ricochets himself back into his body. Clasping his hand to his chest, Thomas lets himself sob.

 

*  *  *

 

Flint meanwhile returns to the cottage and finds Silver standing by the fireplace. Silver turns immediately at the sound of his footsteps and then pauses. “I thought you were Thomas.”

“I imagine you’d prefer it.” Flint says curtly.

Silver cocks his head and looks at him. “What?”

“I know what happened.”

“I don’t know what you-” Silver begins and Flint can’t stand to hear the words come out of his mouth, the lies that Silver will begin to tell him, so he speaks the truth first.

“You fucked Thomas.”

Silver freezes.

“Why?” Flint asks. He expects Silver to tell him because he couldn’t help it, some feeble excuse such as that. Or quite simply, that it was out of revenge.  Something that would make sense.

Silver looks down at the ground, at the ash cold in the fireplace. "I knew I couldn't have you. So…” He gives a helpless shrug of his shoulders. “It’s a poor excuse I know. And it’s not the whole of it. It would be a lie to say I didn’t want Thomas.” But the truth of it starts there. That he couldn’t have Flint and Thomas was there.

“You could have had me." Flint says belatedly. "I thought…” He swallows over the tight lump in his throat. “I thought you knew that." All this time, somehow even though he’d never dared bring it into the light of day for contemplation, he’d somehow thought Silver had known.

Silver stares at him. He takes a step towards Flint, leaning heavily on his crutch, opens his mouth, shuts it again, licks his lips and finally says, “Fuck you.”

“Excuse me?”

“After all this time, you tell me that? Where was that when I would have followed you anywhere? When I _did_ follow you anywhere-”

“Until you didn’t.” Flint cuts him off, and then immediately regrets it. He wants to know the rest of that tirade of Silver’s. How long has this been pent up inside Silver? How long… and what made him turn to Thomas just as Thomas was turning to him?

Silver shakes his head, biting his lip. “You bastard.”

“Hey.” Flint takes a step closer to him. “You could have told me.”

Silver stares up at him with bleak, melancholy eyes. “How could I tell you that I wanted you when I couldn’t tell you the rest of me? That past you neatly defined people by? The story you wanted to fit me into? How could I? How could I say, accept my desire and ask nothing more of me?”

At this point Flint realizes how close they’re standing. All he has to do is reach out a hand and touch it to Silver’s chest, to assess that he’s breathing as rapidly as Flint thinks he is, as rapidly as Flint’s own heart. It’s tantalizing. He stares at Silver’s chest, convinced he can hear it, the clamoring outcry of Silver’s heart.

“What’re you doing?” Silver asks as Flint slowly raises his hand.

Flint places it carefully over Silver’s heart. He can feel the warmth of Silver’s skin, feels the quick intake of Silver’s breath, and there, oh there is Silver’s heart.

“What’re you afraid of?” Flint whispers. They’re not in that forest glade now. And yet, somehow, it’s as though they’ve never left.

Silver inhales again, and Flint watches the sharp curve of his mouth. “That you’re doing this out of a desire for revenge.”

Flint pauses, looking at him puzzled, and then it slots into place. “You think I would do this, because of what happened between you and Thomas?” It’s fitting considering he had thought the same of Silver’s motivations.

“Isn’t that what you think I did?” Silver whispers. “That I only did it because of how precious Thomas is to you.”

“No.” Flint says. “That isn’t what I think. Now.” He amends.

Confusion blooms in Silver’s eyes. “Then...I thought that’s what you were angry about?”

“I’m angry because of how much time we lost.” Flint murmurs. “That after a decade of lost time with one man, I was fool enough to ignore what was happening right in front of me, to pretend it didn’t matter enough to reach out for it.” His hand tightens on Silver’s shirt. “I’m angry because do you know how many times I’ve wanted to kiss you,  you little shit, and held myself back because I thought I didn’t deserve it, that I had no right to put that in front of you?”

Silver’s chest tightens under his grasp. “Then what are you waiting for?”

It’s an exquisitely pointed question. It’s blunt as a stone being pounded into Flint’s skull. What is he waiting for, if this moment is being offered to him now in the balance of time? It was never meant to be easy, and it wasn’t. The entire journey they shared was a legend, a triumph and a tragedy. But even tragedies have moments of joy, and those often fragment into new beginnings of new stories altogether.

He tilts his head and captures Silver’s mouth.

Silver leans his head back, allowing Flint to cup the back of his neck with one hand as the other clenches harder in his shirt, pulling him closer.

There are no words passed between their lips here. Their mouths speak of something else, entirely new and entirely old. The moment when two minds meet once more, is as rich as the meeting of two pairs of lips for the first time.

For Flint it’s like rediscovering a door to himself and letting it be flung open wide.

For Silver it’s like coming home.

 

*  *  *

 

Silver draws back, his breath ragged. “I think, there’s another conversation we need to have but…”

“But?” Flint says, his own heart pounding heavily in his chest. He doesn’t want to stop kissing Silver, not when he’s finally done it.

“Thomas.” Silver says softly. “You have to go to Thomas now.”

At that Flint leans back and looks at him closely. “Where did he go?”

“Out through the trees.” Silver nods at the grove.

Flint nods, goes to the door and stops. He knows Silver is right, and yet, he looks back, reluctant to leave him even now.

Silver straightens up, gripping his crutch tightly. “I’ll be here.”

Flint gives him another nod and goes.

 

*  *  *

 

Silver can’t think. His tongue feels like it has never known what to say, that his lips belong to someone else. He’s never experienced a moment like this before. Even with Madi, when he was bewildered at finding himself stumbling into love with her, he’d some vague semblance of an idea of what to do, even if he fumbled and faltered along the way.

Here he has no fucking clue whatsoever.

He sinks down against the wall, needing it to brace himself. The dog pads in from the other room and looks at him anxiously. Silver makes a low sound, holds out his hand and the dog comes to be stroked, pressing its muzzle eagerly into his palm.

“This is not what I expected to happen.” Silver admits aloud, to himself, to the dog, to the room itself. It doesn’t matter. He strokes the dog’s ears gently.

“You think I’m a fool, don’t you?”

The dog woofs slightly and lays its head on Silver’s knee.

 

*  *  *

 

“Here...here. Thomas. _Thomas_.”

There’s a voice speaking quietly to him, somewhere close by. Thomas looks up to find Flint crouched beside him, looking at him with concerned eyes.

“Thomas.”

He leans back against the tree, sighing as Flint reaches for him, lets Flint put his arms around him. It’s Flint now. Thomas accepts that. It’s been Flint more than James now for some time, and he knows there’s no going back, not completely. He’s not he sure he wants to, even if that were possible. He’s not the former Thomas anymore either.

“What happened to your hand?” Flint’s examining it, frowning. The back of his hand is starting to bruise, knuckles bloody and torn. Thomas reaches up his other hand to cup his face, causing Flint to look up at him quickly.

“I...was angry.” That’s the only excuse he has, and it’s a poor one.

“At me?” Flint asks softly.

"At you...at Silver. At the men who took me away from you, and kept us apart. At the world. Everything.” Thomas looks down at his hand. “I don't want to let that part of myself out."

"It might not be the end of the world if you did." Flint says carefully, and then. “Why now?” There’s Silver at the center, a catalyst for the events of today, but there’s something else here, something that he’s known they need to speak about but he’s not known how.

“You leave me like you left Miranda.” Thomas says bluntly. “I can’t...I can’t _bear_ it anymore.”

Flint raises his head to stare at him. “Excuse me?”

Thomas takes a deep breath. “This must have been what it felt like for her, to be left over and over and over, never knowing if that was the last time she’d ever even see you, if you’d even come back to her. How was that fair to her? How is it fair now to treat me the same?”

“It’s not about fairness. It’s about safety.” Flint begins.

“You’re simply telling yourself that now like you did before with her, so you don’t have to change anything.”

“You only think that because you don’t know what the dangers are.”

“Stop telling me what I think!” Thomas nearly howls and Flint stares at him in surprise.

“I know the world is a terrible place.” Thomas says, his voice dropping to a whisper. “I know that. I am fully aware of that. I may not know what it was like to live as a pirate, but the only way I _can_ know that is if you tell me.”

He leans his head back against the tree, closing his eyes.

Slowly, he feels a hand tentatively placed on his knee as Flint sinks down beside him. Thomas’s hand comes up to close over Flint’s. For a while they sit there in silence, their hands entwined.

 “I’m sorry for leaving you like that.” Flint says finally. “For not talking to you as I should have.” He takes a deep breath. “At times, none of this feels real. I keep expecting for it not to be real, for you to be a ghost. I keep expecting to wake up, to lose you again.”

“It’s real.” Thomas’s hand squeezes his tightly as his eyes open. " _I’m_ real. When will you start treating me like I'm not a ghost?"

“I’ll try.” Flint promises. “I promise I’ll try.” He kisses Thomas’s hand. They both know it’s not that simple, but the acknowledgment of it, eases the burden on Thomas, and Flint can see the relief in his face. He knows he has to attempt to move forward, to allow himself to live in the present and let Thomas do so as well. It’s not fair to keep him a prisoner of the past.

“What about Silver?” Thomas asks after another lengthy peaceful silence. His breathing is calmer now. He knows this isn’t solved, that they will still have to try, and sometimes they will fail, but for the first time since they’ve been reunited, he feels hope trembling within his breast.

“What about him?” Flint says softly. Here in the grove with Thomas, what happened with Silver seems dreamlike too. But that was real as well. They’re both real and for once Flint lets that fact align itself in his brain.

“I’m sorry for what happened.” Thomas murmurs. “I’m sorry I let that need overshadow you and I…”

Flint leans in and kisses him fiercely. “It’s all right. It’s all right.” His arms embrace Thomas and Thomas lets himself be encircled in that embrace, taking a steady breath and letting it out once more. He rests his forehead against Flint’s and sighs.

“What do we do?"

“We have to talk with him for starters.” Flint slowly gets to his feet and offers him a hand up.  Thomas accepts it and they start to make their way through the trees.

 

*  *  *

 

As they walk back to the cottage Flint’s aware that for the first time it feels like there’s a true tomorrow beyond this day. That perhaps, just perhaps, what they have doesn’t have to end here.

That reasoning is possibly why he’s taken slightly aback when they enter the cottage and Silver’s standing there in his old coat, clearly on the verge of departure.

“Are you going somewhere?” Thomas speaks first, eyeing him.

Flint closes the door, leaning against it. Silver had kept his word at least in this respect. He was still here.

“I wanted to make sure you were all right,” Silver begins, his eyes on Thomas’s bruised hand. “That he found you before I-”

“Before what?” Flint’s voice cuts through his hesitation. “Before you left again?” The incredulity is right there, laid bare in the room before them. How could Silver think of leaving again like this? After their conversation? After that kiss? After everything?

“I assumed…” Silver mutters unhappily, “That once you and Thomas talked, you’d want me to go.”  

“I thought you wanted to leave before.” Flint tells him. “Not now.” They gaze at each other.

“I think this conversation is going to take a lot longer than this.” Thomas says. “And I for one, need a drink.” He moves towards the kitchen.

“I’ll build up the fire.” Flint says, for need of something to do.

Silver’s stands there. He casts one more glanced at the door, but finally, he removes his coat, Flint watching him all the while. It isn’t until Silver hangs his coat up that Flint lets himself breathe again.

 

*  *  *

 

In the kitchen Thomas finds a bottle of spiced wine that they had tucked away in a cupboard during the winter. It seems a good idea now. He stands there a moment in the kitchen, taking in the silence. Whatever happens next, he wants to remember this moment before it begins, to take it all into consideration.

Whatever happens next, happens, Thomas thinks, and he knows there are a myriad of possible outcomes. At the forefront of all of them is simply this. He doesn’t want Silver to leave.

He takes the wine and three mugs and goes out.

 

*  *  *

 

They gather in the front room. Flint standing by the mantle, Thomas half seated, half sprawled on the pallet before the fire, and Silver in the armchair, the dog at his feet. They’re all watching each other over their spiced wine, waiting for someone else to start.

At last Flint clears his throat, looks from Thomas to Silver.  “You sent me to Savannah.”

“I did.”

“You slept with Thomas.”

Silver swallows, but nods again. “I did.”

“Is there anything left you want?” Flint says. It’s odd question perhaps, but it’s the one that’s formed itself in his mind.  Silver’s accomplished his goal of ending the war. He’s escaped the Spanish. He’s met Thomas...and he and Flint have acknowledged their desire for each other.

They could leave it there, he knows.

“Of course, there is.” Silver cuts himself off. “But why’re you asking me that? You have all that which you had thought lost. You’re reunited with Thomas. You’re safe. You have a life here, a future here. You don’t want me here.” The laugh he utters is bleak and mirthless. “The other night was proof of that all right.”

“He was doing that to make you jealous.” Thomas says from the fire, his wine halfway to his lips.

Flint glares at him, but he’d known Thomas was going to say that.

“He succeeded.” Silver says softly, his eyes still on Flint. “I am well aware now of all that was within my grasp and that I let it slip away.”

Flint’s grip tightens on the mantelpiece. He could end it here. He could let Silver go. There is no need for this to be anything more than a delayed formal farewell. The words that were never spoken when Silver and he had last parted. That last day Silver had tried to speak with him and Flint had turned away. At that point he had wanted nothing more to do with Silver. Now he wonders what it was that Silver had been intending to say. What could he have said, torn between the agony of betrayal and keeping them alive?

He glances down at Thomas who’s shifted into a relaxed sitting position, one leg drawn up so his arm is resting on his knee, turned towards the fire so that the flames are alight upon his face. Thomas is watching Silver, and the expression on his face entrances Flint.

They’ve come so far, the three of the and here they still are. Is this fate? A curiosity of the gods, simply casting dice and wanting to see what follows upon the game board? Is it selfish to want more? Even now at this point in their lives. That it’s not enough that they’ve merely survived, but to actively want more and seek it and protect it within their grasp?

Thomas shifts slightly and looks up at him. “Flint.” He says softly, and the name on his lips shocks Flint, at how much he’d imagined Thomas speaking it.

He gazes at Thomas, and marvels that that whatever happens here, they are alive to live it.

 _Tell him. Tell him what you need him to know_. He can hear the words as easily as though Thomas had spoken them aloud.

“What about earlier?” Flint says. “Didn’t that mean anything?” It’s impossible for it not to have meant something. He refuses to let it mean nothing. They have survived too much for it to not mean something.

Silver’s head jerks up. “Of course, it did. I just…”

“What happened earlier?” Thomas asks curiously.

“I kissed him.” Flint says, at the same time Silver says, “He kissed me.” They both look away and Thomas just stares at them incredulously.

“I’ve spent the last several months assuming the two of you had been true partners in every sense of the word.” Thomas says quietly. “And now…” He looks at Flint, still waiting, clearly expecting him to do something. The look in Thomas’s eye says ‘ _you can’t possibly leave it there._ ’

Flint glances back to Silver, still seeing the question in his eye. He thinks about what Silver thought before.

“When I learned you and Thomas had...” Flint pauses, and then forces himself onward. “I was jealous. But not for the reasons you supposed.” He pauses again. “Or not only that.” Because there _is_ that as well. The fact that Silver and Thomas had known each other like that when he had only dreamed of it. It does hurt. He can’t deny that. “Because I wasn’t there to see it from its inception. That I didn’t get to see the two of you meeting, or knowing each other or...fucking.”

Flint admits this slowly, feeling the heat overtake his cheeks, at admitting such a thing. For a moment he feels as though he were standing once again in the parlor in the house in London with Miranda coaxing truths and desires out of him as she had kissed her way down his chest.

“I…” Silver hesitates, clearly unsure what to make of this. “Is there a way that we could…” Silver glances at Thomas and then at Flint again. “Surely there is a way to remedy this.”

Thomas cocks his head and smiles at him. “Are you suggesting we fuck for his benefit?” It’s said lightly, almost for sport, if Silver chooses to take it that.

“Not just for his benefit.” Silver’s lips twitch slightly. “Last time I was too feverish to enjoy it as thoroughly as I could.”

Thomas laughs aloud at that.

This is what Flint sensed between them. The laughter underneath the surface, the twin senses of humor reaching out to meet one another across the shared void of their experiences. He wants to simply watch them laugh together.

All right in truth, that’s not all he wants. He is only human, and he’s been torn between two men for a long time. It’s only fair for those desires to meet in the middle.

“Would you like that?” Thomas glances at Flint.

“What do you think?” Flint tells him. But in all honesty, he appreciates Thomas asking him that. “The simple answer is, yes.”

“And the non-simple answer?” Silver cocks his head.

“The non-simple answer is yes, very much.” Flint tells him, taking a sip of his wine. “As long as I get to fuck you after.”

Silver’s lips part a little as he gazes back at Flint.

“If you’re up for that,” Flint says innocently enough and Silver turns his head slightly but can’t quite hide his smile.

“I think I could manage that.”

“Are you truly well enough this time?” Thomas asks softly and Silver sighs.

“I believe so.”

“Show me your wounds.” Flint says abruptly.

Silver looks at him. “Here?”

Flint nods. He needs to see them for himself.

Slowly Silver stands. He leans on his crutch as he reaches for his shirt, drawing it free of his breeches and pulling it over to his head. The bandage across his chest gleams pale in the firelight.

Flint steps closer, laying a hand on that bandage. If it had been any deeper, he could easily have bled out. “And your back.”

Silver draws a heavy breath. “It’s not a pretty sight.”

“I don’t care.” Flint murmurs and slowly Silver turns so Flint can see.

It’s a lie, he does care, but not for how it looks. But for the pain and the horror inflicted upon Silver, the wretchedness that it stirs in Thomas, at having to tend him for this. The deep ravaged wounds made by the whip are healing slowly, but still healing nonetheless. There will be scars, but Silver will live to bear them. Flint places a hand gently on Silver’s back, feels his intake of breath at the touch.

Thomas has risen to his feet as well.

“This time, how shall it be?” Silver whispers.

“This time I want your cock in me.” Thomas says, reaching for Silver’s hips, drawing him closer. “You told me very little about John Silver,” this is to Flint, “but one thing you deliberately withheld was the beauty of this.” His hand strokes down the lengthy curve of Silver’s cock, stiffening in his breeches.

Flint sucks in a breath. “Possibly because it was not my place at the time to speak of it, or stroke it, or take it.”

Silver shoots him a look, and yes, that’s exactly Flint intended his words to inspire. The very image of Flint doing all those things, and he watches, with quiet amused satisfaction as Silver stiffens even more.

“And now?” Thomas inquires, his hand still on Silver, his gaze resting on Flint.

“Now.” Flint considers. “I want to see him fuck you.” His own hand drops down to Silver’s hip, as he leans in closer to Silver. “Before I fuck him.”

Silver darts another look at him. “You certainly have expectations as to my stamina.”

“Yes,” Flint says steadily. “I do.”

He’s seen Silver push himself harder than most men, in his effort to keep up the facade that the crew needed to believe, he’s seen him strive further to achieve their goals when most would have given up. He’ll be damned if he doesn’t think Silver makes the same effort in bed.

“Here, or the bedroom?” Thomas asks.

“Here.” Silver says.

Flint raises an eyebrow.

“I want you both here.” Silver says. “Where you fucked the other night while I was listening.”

A smile steals over Thomas’s face. “Very well.” He finds where they tucked the oil, and fetches another blanket or two to add more padding to the pallet, while Flint adds another log to the fire.

When he sits back, Silver’s sitting there upon the pallet, just looking at him. Flint reaches out a hand to touch a curl. “The knife wound.”

“Would have been a lot deeper without the training you gave me.” Silver says lightly.

“Silver.”

Thomas returns with the other blankets. “Move a little so I can spread these out.”

Silver pushes himself out of the way and Flint draws over him between his legs. Silver glances up at him as he presses against Flint.

Flint just looks at him without speaking. Of course he’s already hard.

“There.” Thomas says. “Now…?”

“Take your clothes off.” Silver says. “The both of you.”

In the glow of the firelight, Flint watches Silver watch them undress, Silver’s gaze shifting from first one to the other. He discards his clothes and sits back naked, gazing back at Silver. Thomas kneels, anticipatory, looking at the both of them.

“I believe you said you wanted his cock in you.” Flint murmurs.

“If that’s agreeable.” Thomas says lazily.

Silver makes a faint sound. “Yes, that’s agreeable.”

“Lie back.” Thomas says and Silver does. Thomas reaches for his breeches, unfastening them and drawing them down over his hips, along with his underclothes until Silver’s as naked as the two of them.

Thomas lays his clothes aside and sits back. He looks at Silver, and then at Flint, before lowering his head between Silver’s thighs.

Silver draws in a sharp breath as Thomas starts to suck his cock.

Flint leans back, just watching, though his mouth aches to kiss Silver, to feel the tremors passing through his body as Thomas’s mouth is upon him. He holds himself back for now.

Until he gets an idea, and then he can’t quite resist any longer. He moves behind Thomas, drawing a hand down his lower back and lowers his mouth. Thomas’s moan of pleasure vibrates around Silver’s cock. Silver who can’t take his eyes off Flint. Flint grins at him over the slope of Thomas’s buttocks and pushes his tongue back inside Thomas once more.

He has always enjoyed doing this, from the very first time, and the feeling of Thomas’s rim quivering around his tongue as he’s pushed closer to the edge is delightful.

“Enough.” Thomas draws off with a faint wet pop, his eyes dazed. He looks at Flint. “You…”

Flint sits back, an innocent expression on his face as he reaches for his wine and takes a swig. Thomas just shakes his head reaching for the oil.

Silver’s fully hard now, and Flint lets himself look now without restraint there. Thomas is right. Silver’s length is most impressive. He’s never truly let himself think on it as much as he would have liked to, until now. Now he gazes at Silver’s cock, and thinks of it inside Thomas. His own cock hardens more, and he watches Silver’s eyes glance sideways, tracking Flint’s arousal even as Thomas moves over him.

He watches as Thomas slicks Silver and positions himself.

Thomas sinks down upon Silver’s cock with a low groan of pleasure. He rocks his hips slightly, sinking further and Silver’s hands flatten upon his chest gently.

“How did you keep from doing this?” Thomas groans.

Silver smothers a laugh, looking up at Flint. “I truly don’t know.”

Flint presses a kiss to Thomas’s shoulder. “I told you, there were a great many things to think of.” He looks again at Silver, watching where Thomas and he are joined together, fitting so neatly as their bodies move. “But to be honest, right now I haven’t the faintest clue.”

Thomas turns his head and kisses him. Flint’s hand strokes over his chest, and down to his cock. He strokes Thomas in time with their rhythm.

“How does he feel?” Flint whispers as Thomas groans into his mouth.

“Magnificent.” Thomas tells him.

Silver shudders as he comes inside Thomas, Thomas in turn spilling across his stomach. A few drops spatter across the bandage and Thomas makes a face. Flint just laughs and goes to fetch a cloth for them.

“I’ll have to change that at some point.” Thomas gestures at the bandage.

“Later.” Silver murmurs. There’s no point doing it right now.

Thomas grins at him and leans down to kiss his mouth.  “I’ve wanted that for some time.”

Silver looks up at him as though he doesn’t quite believe him, even now, even as he’s slipping out of Thomas. Then he truly looks at Thomas, and sees the sincerity in Thomas’s eyes. He thinks again of Thomas’s words. _I was always drawn to you._

He leans up and kisses Thomas again, letting it speak for him.

 

*  *  *

 

“Well, that was certainly worth waiting for.” Thomas murmurs. He’s stretched out across the pallet again, having cleaned himself and Silver off. “Now it’s your turn.” He looks at Flint meaningfully.

“I’ll need a moment.” Silver says almost apologetically. Thomas looks at him quickly to make sure he’s not feverish and Silver laughs, simply gesturing to his cock.

“Ah, of course.” Thomas chuckles.

Flint merely reaches for a pillow. “Here. Turn over.”

“Why?”

“Turn over.” Flint says again, and this time Silver does. Thomas eases another pillow under him, so that his chest wound is protected as well.

“How’s that?”

“It’s fine.” Silver says faintly. “Just….what’re you planning to do?”

“I’m taking my time while you recover.” Flint says easily. He slides the pillow further under Silver’s hips, before smoothing his palms over Silver’s cheeks.

“Flint.” Silver’s voice catches as he realizes what Flint’s about to do. He gasps at the first lick of Flint’s tongue along the cleft of his ass. He’d been mesmerized when Flint had done this to Thomas. Now, having Flint touch him like this is almost too much. If he hadn’t just come, he’d be spending again right now.

Silver groans into his folded arms as Flint’s explores him with his tongue. His body shivers, all the way from his shoulders to his twin cheeks and Flint lays a hand on his lower back, coaxing him to stillness as he slips his tongue inside. Silver groans again, feeling the heat rise in his body as his cock stiffens once more. His hips twitch faintly as Flint presses further.

Thomas sits there, just looking at Silver’s back silently. He reaches out a hand, slowly tracing along the curve of one lash mark.

Flint raises his head slightly, gazing at him. “Thomas.”

Thomas shakes his head slightly. ‘I’m all right.” He gazes down at Silver laying between them. “I’m just sorry this happened.”

Slowly he leans down and kisses Silver’s healing back.

Silver turns his head and looks at him, reaching for Thomas, drawing him closer to kiss him.

Flint sits back on his heels and then rises, going into the kitchen. He rinses out his mouth and takes a moment to stand there in the darkness. His skin feels too hot from the fire and the desire coursing through him, and the knowledge that this is truly happening, that Silver is alive and here. It’s not a dream.

He goes back to the front room and looks at them. Silver’s sitting up and Thomas has his arms around him as they kiss. Flint’s heart pulses at the sight. There are no words that convey the emotions within him now.

Thomas draws back, still smiling at Silver. He catches sight of Flint, and gestures for him to come back to them.

Flint draws close and sinks down beside Silver.  He lifts a hand to Silver’s throat, simply caressing his skin with his knuckles before his hand wanders up to Silver’s face.

He’s right. His thumb fits perfectly within that crease of Silver’s lower lip. Flint leans in to kiss him.

“Please.” Silver whispers. “We’ve waited long enough.”

It’s true. Flint can’t deny it.

He reaches for the oil, and then Silver takes it from him, slicking him and Flint’s heart pounds in his chest as Silver’s hand are upon him.

He draws Silver down upon his cock slowly, watching the emotions flutter across Silver’s face like a dream. Fear, vulnerability, desire, lust, love, love, so much love that Flint’s breath catches.

“I should have fucked you years ago.” He murmurs. Here is where Silver can’t lie or hold back, here all of him spills forth, raw and true. Here is his truest self, his heart, his soul laid bare.

The noise Silver makes is half laugh, half sob and then then he places his hands on Flint’s shoulders and moves.

Flint groans at the sensations flooding through his body. Having Silver here with him and Thomas is too much. It overwhelms him, as he leans in to kiss his mouth.

Silver presses against Flint, his fingers gripping Flint’s shoulders. Thomas is behind him, kissing his shoulder, his chest framing Silver’s back. Silver reaches for Thomas’s injured hand, kissing his knuckles softly. Flint meets his gaze over Silver’s shoulder and the look in Thomas’s eyes makes his heart sing.

Here, together, the three of them. Nothing else matters now.

 

*  *  *

 

“What are you thinking of?” Thomas asks drowsily.

The fire has died down some, the room is full of shadows and the promise of sleep and warmth. They are all stretched out upon the pallet, in varying degrees of lethargy.

“How none of us are the men we used to be.” Flint says quietly. He gazes at the flickering flames. “How things have changed over the last ten years.”

“No, you’re right.” Thomas agrees. “Ten years is a lifetime.”

Silver’s quiet, clasping a hand around his knee. “Perhaps that’s a good thing.” He says softly, his eyes on the flames as well. “Perhaps we might not be here now if I had met either of you ten years ago.”

“Why?” Thomas glances at him. “What would we have made of you ten years ago?”

Flint starts to say _don’t push, don’t ask_. Silver’s secrets are still his own.

Silver glances at the fire again. “Ten years ago...you would have found me, a cocksure liar, prone to nightmares and pick-pocketing, not yet fully aware of how simple it is to manipulate men, but on the path to it.”

Flint’s completely still, utterly astonished. This is true. He can feel it in his bones, how Silver’s telling it. He’s heard Silver lie. He knows the feel of that too, and this is different. The sincerity of it is a shock.

Thomas nods to himself. “Have the nightmares stopped?”

Silver’s gaze shifts towards Flint. “Not entirely. Mutated into something more...tangible, more dreams than nightmares now.” He clasps his knee tighter, trying to explain. “I don’t want them to end, not as I used to.”

“Oh?” Thomas nudges the end of a log back into the grate.

“No.” Silver says simply. He’s still looking at Flint.

Flint eyes him in the dying firelight. Seeing how the healing bruises lays new shadows of its own design across Silver’s bare form. His gaze drifts down between Silver’s legs, eying his cock too. Quiescent, peaceful, vulnerable. A different sort of vulnerability, but just as rare. He looks up and catches Silver’s gaze. Silver’s legs slacken a little, letting his thighs fall more open. Flint grins, startled into pure simple pleasure at Silver giving him this freedom, the permission to look at him.

“No.” Thomas murmurs. “Sometimes the dreams are the only moments we have with them.”

Flint places a hand over his, gentle with the bruises upon Thomas’s skin. He still has the urge to protect him, and he will, but he has to let Thomas breathe, he has to let him live. What has it all been for, if they don’t truly live their lives now?

He holds Thomas’s hand and his other moves naturally to settle upon Silver’s thigh.

A very small part of him could be jealous that Silver opened up to Thomas asking the question. The rest of him is simply grateful Thomas asked.

 

*  *  *

 

In the middle of the night Flint wakes to find only Thomas beside him. He pulls on his shirt before going in search of Silver.

He finds Silver sitting on the porch step in the moonlight.

“Second thoughts now that you’ve had the both of us?” Flint says lightly as he sits down beside Silver. It feels like a hundred other conversations they’ve shared. He never thought he’d have a chance to sit with Silver like this again.

Silver shakes his head, chuckling in spite of himself. “No. I’m wondering at how even now...even now after being fortunate to spend these hours with you and Thomas, I still find myself doubting the very things I wish I believe.”

“Tell me of these things.” Flint asks quietly. He waits, listening to the sounds of the night before Silver finally speaks.

“I want to believe this is real. That you and I and Thomas share something rare and true.” Silver looks out at the dark garden, the moonlight gliding over the bushes and trees. “But if I let myself believe that, if I accept that is real, then I have to accept the fact that it can all be stripped away once more. Then I have to consider the nature of how it all came to be.” He looks at Flint. “Can you ever truly forgive me for being with Thomas first?”

“I’ve forgiven you worse things.” Flint tells him.

A look of true astonishment crosses Silver’s face, shifting to wonder. “How...is that possible?”

“I’ve thought about it a great deal over the last few days. The nature of your actions, the nature of you.” Flint looks at him. “You sent me to Savannah to stop the war and because you love me. Madi ended things with you, but rescued you from the Spanish and brought you to this shore, I suspect because she still cares for you. Thomas…” Flint pauses. “I cannot speak entirely for Thomas, but I suspect the nature of his feelings are not slight either.” He looks at Silver’s face, pale and alive in the moonlight.

“If you believe those things, they are true.” he leans in, cupping Silver’s cheek. “Believe that I love you at least, even though I never thought I would have the opportunity to say it.”

Silver leans into his touch, pressing his face to Flint’s hand.

“So now that you’ve had the opportunity to say it,” Silver murmurs. “Now do you want me to go?"

Flint leans in, cupping his cheek, whispering, “If you think that, you haven't been paying attention,” before he kisses Silver.

Whatever it was that brought John Silver back, fate, or destiny or fuck knows what, Flint doesn’t care. He’s only grateful that it happened.

 

 


End file.
